i am not unbreakable (i am breaking right now)
by Mynsii
Summary: With a wedding looming on the horizon, Keith laments his relationship with Shiro. He wants to know just how Shiro could have missed the signs all these years. It never occurs to him that Shiro might be thinking the same thing.


**AN: for full, unedited (rated E) scenes, please view the story on ao3 [user: mynsii]**

* * *

**KEITH**

It begins where it ends.

With a carefully pressed black and white wedding invitation.

It's weighted with a finality that Keith is ill-equipped to deal with. The confirmation that it's not going to work out. That it was _never _going to work out.

Objectively, Keith knows this. Shiro is with Adam, and he's practically still a kid, even if his birth certificate says otherwise. While Shiro is barely scraping real adulthood himself (he's recently applied for a real mortgage, a fact that blows Keith's mind), he's always been an old soul, and sometimes two years feels more like two decades. At any rate, Keith isn't blind to his flaws. While his father's premature death ensured he can take care of himself, he knows he's broken and stunted in so many ways. Shiro simply deserves more than he could ever possibly give him. Shiro has always been untouchable, not just because of Adam, but because Shiro's destiny lies amongst the stars, while Keith's does not.

In real life you can't always get the person of your dreams. The planets don't align, intertwining your destinies, and sometimes heartbreak isn't a temporary plot device, but simply heartbreak.

Objectively, Keith never stood a chance.

Unfortunately for Keith, objectivity doesn't soothe the pain.

**.: I :.**

Keith and Shiro meet a few weeks into Keith's freshman year at Garrison University. Keith is primarily studying astrophysics, though he takes art classes on the side, while Shiro is a junior working towards a degree in astronomy. Their shared interest in the universe is masked behind opposing decorative fronts; a collection of shamelessly skin tight skinny jeans and a beat up, studded faux-leather jacket for Keith, and sweatpants with wife-beaters and lettermans for Shiro.

Where Shiro is the Garrison golden child, a sun that students and teachers alike can't help but orbit around, Keith is a collapsing star that most people avoid, lest they get caught in the influence of his gravity. It's unsurprising that they exist in entirely different social circles, if Keith even has a social circle - runaway carbon detonation something most sensible people tend to shy away from – and in an ideal world they'd have never met.

Alas, idealism and realism rarely co-exist, and Pidge is the catalyst that brings them both together.

"You can at least smile and act like you want to be here," Pidge says, throwing a sharp elbow into Keith's ribcage. There's strength behind her spindly limbs and five-foot-nothing frame that frankly scares Keith, and he's sure that, if she wanted to, she could easily kill him and dispose of his body. The thought alone makes Keith's chest swell with a small, burning globule of affection.

"But I _don't _want to be here. I only agreed to tag along because you threatened me," Keith sulks in response, lacking all sense of self preservation and shoving his hands into his pockets. It's only a half-truth; his mother and Kolivan insisted that he go to his first college party, _really _soak up the authentic college experience that Netflix original movies try and sell to the masses. He'd rather be anywhere else, but he knows that Krolia festers in her guilt over keeping him at home rather than packing him off to a dorm, so he doesn't argue against her. "I do have a life you know."

The look Pidge shoots him suggests she doesn't believe him, but that's a quality Keith quietly likes about her. She is one of the few people he's actually made friends with. Or, rather, Pidge made friends with Keith, and he had neither the energy, nor the heart, to fight her as he would most anyone else. It helps that she is smart, blunt, and unafraid to call him out on his social failings.

"Oh, stop complaining," Pidge huffs, skirting past a quartet of upperclassmen playing a rather animated game of Bullshit! on the living room floor. She squints at their cards, then at their scattered bottles and half-foam beers, and lets out a covetous sigh. "Lance and Hunk said they'd be here in thirty, so help me find something to drink."

"Can't we just wait for the—"

"_No. _Move it."

There are way too many people milling around, most gathered in small, fragmented groups, a few couples dotted here and there, making out or pressed close together. There's no sign of a bar, though, nothing to indicate where the alcohol is being stashed.

A rogue solo cup narrowly misses the side of Keith's head, and his midriff-baring shirt is showered with a light rain of residual beer.

"Assholes," Keith hisses under his breath, glaring in the general direction of the assault. A few party-goers shrink back guiltily, but the hand on his shoulder and Pidge's quiet '_play nice' _stop him from pursuing them.

Keith hears it then. A beat of raucous laughter followed by the unmistakable spluttering and something wet. He reaches blindly for Pidge's arm, follows the noise, the fresh chorus of _chug, chug, chug, _acting as a homing beacon.

When Keith finally meets Shiro, the man and not the legend, he's in the middle of a keg stand; the stained wife-beater he's barely wearing rides up enough to reveal a thick trail of coarse, black hair, and his prosthetic arm is covered in peeling stickers.

Froth dripping down his chin, red-eyed and slightly snotty, he looks absolutely beautiful.

**.: II :.**

Keith eyes the invitation from over the rim of his coffee cup, fingers curling tighter around the chipped ceramic mug.

The words 'and guest' are written in perfect cursive next to his name, and that almost feels as though it has to be a joke - a cruel one at that. Everyone and anyone he could possibly bring with him, including his _mother, _are already in possession of an invitation of their own.

Keith doesn't think that it was Shiro's doing.

In fact, Keith doesn't think Shiro had much to do with the invitations at all. The lace trim and formal use of 'Mr Weston and Mr Shirogane' rather than their forenames or nicknames is telling, and there's something clinical about the stark black and white colour scheme that reminds Keith of scuffed leather sofas in barren waiting rooms. It's unpleasant, almost medicinal, not Shiro at all, and the sting of Shiro's absence in his own wedding is nearly as potent as the twist in his gut whenever he thinks about Shiro marrying someone else.

It's a briny, bitter feeling that he doesn't quite have to strength the repress, but that doesn't mean he has to acknowledge it either. Abandonment issues aren't new; if Keith could afford a therapist he'd probably have something far more technical than 'fucked up' to describe his issues with attachment and dependency. He's bottled up his father's death and mother's absences in his life well enough, now he just has to cram Shiro's marriage in there and force the cork down.

The image he has cultivated for himself doesn't allow for an overripe heart that's puffy and bruised from a lifetime of neglect.

He abandons the practically untouched coffee cup next to the invitation, reaching into his pocket to grope for his phone. He considers reaching out to Krolia or Kolivan, but he's not quite tragic enough to cry on his mother or not-quite-stepfather's shoulders, and he knows that they'll agonize over it, so he rapidly fires off texts to Pidge, Hunk and Lance instead. They don't bleed anything too personal, just a short, blunt invitation to grab breakfast with the implication he's hungover as shit.

Lance is the first to reply.

** [Lance] [09:07 AM]**

dude i'm pretty sure that i have food poisoning. my colon is falling out

** [Lance] [09:07 AM]**

i'll be there in 5

**.: III :.**

If pressed, or feeling particularly drunk and vulnerable, Keith will reluctantly admit that he fell in love with Takashi 'Shiro' Shirogane the day that he marched into Dean Iverson's office and passionately argued against Keith's possible expulsion. He'd launched into a thirty minute presentation on why Keith breaking another student's nose wasn't his fault; how James Griffin had more than deserved what he'd got, and had even threatened to drop out should Keith lose his scholarship.

However, that is a lie.

If Keith is being truly honest, he fell in love with Shiro the moment he set eyes on him. But that's a little too cliché for his liking.

**.: IV :.**

Keith tugs at the hem of his shirt, wishing he'd worn something he hadn't accidentally shrunk in the wash. It adds to his aesthetic, and when confronted by an arched eyebrow he can pretend that is was intentional, but right now it does nothing to shield him from plummeting October temperatures. He hunches further into his jacket, squinting at the star dappled sky as he huffs out a foggy breath.

He should probably be inside socialising, it is his first college party after all, but he can only tolerate humans for snatched periods of time, and he's already close to his limit. He doubts that the others miss his presence all that much, anyway.

Almost immediately after showing up Lance had gravitated towards a beautiful senior who'd introduced herself as Allura when she'd collapsed onto a sofa next to their group, much to the chagrin of her (equally as regal) companions. Pidge had embarked on a quest to find her brother, while Hunk had gotten lost in his search for the bathroom, and Keith suspects that he's probably befriended a slew of people on his journey. None of them need him, and he guesses that the two men only tolerate his presence because of Pidge, anyway.

The thought wounds him more than he anticipated it would but has no real shock value. He's used to it by now.

If he were a better man, perhaps he'd try and make friends. There are swarms of people milling about. But Keith's not good at performative deference, can't make small talk for shit, and he's not great as masking his boredom. He's just not a good fit in this scene, so he considers calling up an Uber and heading home.

He stays because he promised Pidge that he'd get her home, and he doesn't want to let her down. The wraparound porch is safe enough, the chilly night air enough to force even the most inebriated inside. He can think in the silence, cold as it may be, and it helps ground him a little.

The universe, as always, has other ideas.

"Your name's Keith, right?"

Shiro is standing in front of him, arms crossed over his impossibly broad chest, an amused smile tugging at the corner of his lips. The wife-beater he was wearing during the keg stand hides behind a zip-up grey hoodie with their university logo stitched artfully on the bicep, and the dark forelock that falls over his face is fluffy and mussed. His sweatpants strain across his thighs, and if he squints Keith is sure he can make out the outline of Shiro's dick.

He's a Greek god clad in Hollister and Nike.

"You know who I am?" Keith asks lamely, the squeak in his voice betraying the calm he hopes he's projecting. To compensate he toes at an overstuffed ashtray with his Docs, straightening his back and adopting a stance he hopes comes across as relaxed indifference.

"Sure I do, you're the kid who's breaking all of my scholastic records. Plus you're Katie's friend. Matt and I have heard a lot about you," Shiro replies easily, taking a small step towards him and outstretching his bionic hand. "I'm Shiro."

The introduction is entirely unnecessary. Even if Keith hadn't heard his name fluttering around campus like migrating nymphalidae, Pidge had caught him staring while Shiro's lips were wrapped around the tap and shared his name with a sly smile and a '_he lived with us for a while, you know'. _

Keith eyes the offered hand with suspicion that he'd probably have a better time selling if his heart wasn't beating a pretty violent rhythm against his ribcage, before subtly pressing his palm against his thigh and slotting it against Shiro's.

Shiro's hand is _huge, _dwarfing Keith's own. He can't tell if the artificial one is oversized, but he suspects that everything about Shiro is break contact quickly, and Keith is glad for the reprieve because his hands are trembling slightly and he can feel the skin getting slick again. The fact that Shiro offered the bionic hand is a small mercy, and Keith clings to his assumption that the nerve receptors aren't sensitive enough to pick up on his anxieties.

"Why are you out here all alone?" Shiro asks, leaning against the porch railing and not quite making eye contact. It feels like a trap. Even if Shiro needed to come out for air, there's no reason he has to make small talk with Keith.

Keith sets his jaw and shrugs. "I don't really do people."

"Ouch," Shiro chuckles, scrubbing his hand through his hair. "Is that a hint?"

"Fuck, no I," there's a swell of panic within Keith that's difficult to express, new and unchartered. He shouldn't care what Shiro thinks of him, but he feels compelled to impress. Keith tries not to make a habit of deifying people, it makes the inevitable loss that much more traumatic, but Shiro looks as though he's the son of Iapetus and he can't help but place him on some sort of pedestal. "I just don't have any friends in there."

"Oh. I thought…. Ka—Pidge? And the other two she's with, Hank and Lars?"

"_Hunk _and _Lance_, and they're not my friends. They're just classmates" Keith says, the slight upturn of his mouth contradicting the accompanying eyeroll.

"You're very 'Cry Little Sister', aren't you?"

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"Just that you look like you've walked out of a Joel Schumacher movie," Shiro's teasing him, and Keith can feel his cheeks flush red. He wants to blame it on the alcohol, but he's barely touched a drop the entire time that he's been here. "It's not a bad thing."

To stop his rapidly softening edges from pealing back, Keith scowls. "Why are _you _out here?"

Shiro has the audacity to grin and impishly scratch at the back of his neck in return. "I saw you."

**.: V :.**

"Dude, you must have a stomach made of steel. Hunk called me at 3am to tell me he was ninety percent certain he was dying."

"He'll be fine, Hunk's too nice to die. Not without baking us a final parting gift."

"True."

Lance greets Keith while perched against the bonnet of his battered blue 1989 Ford pickup, the car that Lance himself was likely conceived in before his father handed it down. He looks like the kind of straggly, disease infested deer that not even the hungriest wolves in the pack would bother hunting, and Keith feels a slight pang of guilt for having dragged him out.

But then Keith remembers all of the hangovers that Lance has interrupted over the years, energy levels impossibly high, voice agonisingly loud, and his conscious is somewhat soothed.

Still, Keith is nothing short of practical, and he doesn't want to die in a wreck if Lance suddenly perishes behind the wheel, so he asks "are you sure you should be driving? We can take Red."

Lance shakes his head, "there's a slim chance I'll shit and or vomit all over myself between here and Coran's. If my guts open up in your car you might actually kill me."

It's a sound argument, and so Keith hops in the passenger seat, kicks at the McDonalds wrappers scattered across the floor, and fiddles with the dial of the radio obnoxiously until Lance shoves an aux cable at him. The routine is comfortable, familiar. Keith presses his face against the window closes his eyes and draws in a deep breath, the air is musky, and he's pretty sure he can _taste _Lance, but when he breathes out again he feels lighter. He drifts somewhere close to a doze the entire drive, lulled by the stuttering engine and the sound of Lance's voice as he sporadically sings along.

Miraculously, Lance doesn't shit himself.

They don't talk, but their silences haven't been permeated with that awkward restlessness for a long time, so it's a comfort Keith can allow himself to sink into. They've learnt to relax and adapt, and the frayed ends of their short-lived rivalry have been reweaved into a bond that runs deeper than blood. Trusting Lance to safely pilot him to their destination, Keith allows himself to float.

He almost doesn't notice them pull up into the parking lot.

"Hey, Sleeping Beauty, we're here," Lance elbows Keith's ribs far gentler than he should. Lance stifles a messy burp with the back of his hand, blinks twice, then continues. "I'm going to start charging Motel 6 prices every time one of you guys falls asleep in my car. I could probably pay off my student loans in like, I don't know, a year."

"It's a sound business plan."

Coran's is a wooden shack-turned-_something _that specialises in the greasiest foods and strangest service. They've been coming here the since a particularly bad case of midterm burnout during their first year of college, a collective, sleep-deprivation induced breakdown forcing the entire group to cram themselves into a booth and pray for breakfast foods and resolution. The pale orange walls are lined with newspaper clippings and blurry photographs documenting UFO sightings and evidence of cryptids, and Keith hasn't heard of half of the items on the menu, too afraid to ask if huhu grubs are exactly what they sound like.

Shiro had very nearly ordered some once, his arm slung casually over Keith's shoulders as he proposed his brilliant idea. His thumb had absently trailed over Keith's clavicle as Hunk begged him to reconsider, and so pancakes were plated up instead. Shiro had gotten maple syrup down his favourite v-neck, blushing profusely when he realised that the other gym rats would catch him out for cheating on his diet.

The memory is pleasant, even if the aftertaste hits Keith's tongue like vinegar.

"Ah, Keith, Lance. It's been a while since I've seen you boys," the eponymous Coran bellows the moment they step through the door, scrubbing at a purple mug with 'SPACE DADDY' etched in pink on the side. It clashes nicely with the once yellow, now flour dusted, Hawaiian shirt and hideous green city shorts that he's wearing. "What can I do for you today?"

"Coran, just load my plate with every carb you have," Lance sighs dramatically, planting both hands on the countertop with a loud smack. "I mean _every _carb. My life depends on it."

"Okay, that's the twelve generous kilos of gluten coming right up for the gentleman on death row. I presume you'll be wanting your usual, Keith?" Coran asks, placing the mug down and smoothing his hands over his apron. Keith's usual is a hot mess of pancakes and French toast stacked and cemented together with chocolate syrup and topped with a single strip of bacon. It's probably going to contribute to his premature death, but they're addictive, and so clogged arteries and poor insulin regulation remain Future Keith's problem. He nods, and satisfied with his contribution to heart disease, Coran refocuses on Lance. "You look like my grandmother after a particularly bad case of the slipperies."

"Am I having some sort of stroke?" Lance asks, throwing his hands up and shaking his head in defeat. "I'm definitely having some sort of stroke because I can smell toast and I understood most of those words individually, but still have no idea what you just said."

"Oh, you boys and your strange sense of humour."

Coran scuttles off to prepare their food, and Lance pulls one final face of despair before allowing himself to be dragged over to their usual booth. It feels slightly strange, Keith thinks, just the two of them, and the unoccupied space inspires an odd shadow of loneliness that he hasn't truly felt in years. Of course, that's not down to the seating arrangement alone.

"Dude, I'm pretty sure my sister has the hots for one of Lotor's friends, so that's a thing now. I literally cannot escape him. Is this what hell is? I'm pretty sure this is what hell is," Lance bathes in his own cartoonish, overdramatic misery, and Keith just rolls his eyes.

"I think Veronica and Acxa make a good couple."

"You're not allowed to comment because you have the _worst _taste. You dip your fries _and _your pizza in milkshake. Frankly, just looking at you disgusts me, but love is blind, so I put up with you."

"Gee, your benevolence is truly mind-blowing," Keith says flatly.

"Keith," Lance whines. "I don't want Lotor as my brother-in-law. Can't you date Acxa instead? Or Veronica? 'Cause if we were brothers, at least we could hang out and play videogames or whatever."

"Lance, this is apparently going to come as a shock to you, but I am very, _very _gay," Keith says, quirking an eyebrow. "Besides, I don't think Acxa and Lotor are even related, let alone siblings. Lotor is pretty much the Only Child poster boy."

"Technicalities."

They continue to bicker and make small talk as they wait for their food, Lance telling animated stories about the assholes he has to deal with in work, urged on by Keith's occasional question or remark. It's a decent distraction, until Coran returns with two stacks of food and the temperature shifts.

"So," Lance starts, stabbing at a hash brown and lifting the entire thing to his lips. "You got it then?"

"Got what?" Keith is not a coward, but his refusal to wear his heart so openly on his sleeve necessitates tactical retreats from the truth. The elephant in the room is an amputee with canities, and though they both know that it's there, Keith was hoping he could have at least gorged himself on sugar and artificial preservatives first.

"Really, Keith? Come on. I got the invitation too," Lance says, far too softly. There's an undercurrent there that resembles pity, and Keith wants to squirm away from it. It's his own doing, though. Afterall, the save-the-dates went out months ago, and Keith hasn't seemed to have learnt his lesson in self-preservation. If anything, he's getting worse. "I know you must be pretty bummed. I get it."

And Keith knows that he does.

He's seen the longing in Lances eyes, burning, unreciprocated, whenever Allura isn't looking. He's watched the easy-going, prankster façade splinter whenever Allura and Lotor walk into a room together, hands intertwined. Keith has also seen Lance gather himself up and press on. Smile at both the object of his affection and the object of hers, refusing to let whatever it is that he is feeling sour their friendship, and he knows he should probably give Lance more credit because that shit's _hard_.

"I don't want to go to Shiro's wedding," Keith says, deciding that his friend at the very least deserves the truth. It's a statement that's as damning as it is freeing, and Keith tries not to think about how wet and broken Shiro's name sounded leaving his lips.

"I figured."

If it were Hunk or Pidge he was talking to, they'd be steadfastly attempting to change his mind. After all, one of their best friends is getting married, and it would feel wrong for any of them to be absent. Lance merely offers him a sympathetic quirk of his lips, and it's enough to lessen the oppressive weight that's been bearing down on Keith's chest all morning.

"So, how many pancakes do you think I'll be able to eat in one sitting until I puke?"

**.: VI :.**

"You almost got expelled? I don't buy it."

"Well, maybe not _expelled_, but I could have gotten into a lot of trouble if they'd caught me."

"Those are two totally separate things, Shiro."

It's hard to tell how long they've been stood on the wraparound together, time feels warped and mangled, though pleasantly so. No one has come looking for them, or, perhaps they have, but they were unable to penetrate the bubble that engulfs them. Either way, it's just been him and Shiro for a while, and it isn't terrible. He wants to feel bad about abandoning Pidge, but Shiro is buoyant, almost brazen with his brightness, and Keith can't help but prioritise him.

They're talking about everything and nothing. Awkward small talk and pre-amble out of the way, they dive headfirst into more personal topics like they're old friends.

Mostly, they're discussing Keith's workload, and the lecturers that they've shared, the academic records they've both beaten, and it's_easy_.

Shiro is telling him horror stories that mostly centre around pop quizzes and hungover students, populated by faceless people with names he doesn't recognise, and still Keith is mesmerised. He finds himself occasionally huffing out a small laugh that morphs into something more when Shiro beams in response. If Keith were the sentimental type he'd call Shiro charming, but he's not, so for the sake of his internalised dignity he settles on fascinating. Even that feels grossly unfair when paired with Shiro's academic excellence, sculpted body, and frankly dorky personality.

Keith is doomed.

Shiro is halfway through a story about Iverson nearly catching him breaking into the main building after hours – not even to do anything fun or rebellious, but to return a piece of equipment that he'd accidentally 'stolen' - when Keith hands Shiro the joint he'd all but forgotten about without thinking.

Keith belatedly notices the sweeping look of apprehension flicker across Shiro's face. The way his outstretched fingers hesitate for a second before snatching. Shiro is Reagan's bright-futured 'Say No' poster boy, and Keith is the greasy stoner lacking prospects.

"You don't have to," Keith says, low and gentle.

As though eager to push past their assigned roles, or, perhaps, desperate to re-enact his favourite movie cliché, Shiro attempts a hit. It's juvenile and unskilled; without even trying to hold the smoke, Shiro coughs gracelessly, his skin reddening and eyes watering. It's endearing in the strangest of ways, making Keith's heart hiccup in his chest. "Sorry, I've never done this before."

"God, you're such a good boy," Keith laughs out before he can think over the word choice. It was meant to sound patronising, but the words come out breathless and affectionate. "I should have known. You're a bible camper's wet dream."

"Jesus, Keith." Shiro says, the pleased upturn of his lips contradicting the darkening pink of his skin. He breathes Keith's name like they've known each other for an eternity, and not just the duration of an evening. The lingering familiarity should be terrifying, and Keith knows that, but he can't bring himself to care.

There's a cheer from within the frat house that momentarily distracts them, reminds them that they are at a party and very much not alone, and the smile dies. Shiro ducks his head almost guiltily, pinching the bridge of his nose before murmuring something under his breath that Keith can't quite puzzle out.

"Hey," a spark of confidence and the beginnings of a bad idea coalesce, urged on adrenaline and cheap beer, and Keith retrieves the joint with heavy intent. If he's fated to play the villain in an afterschool special, he may as well revel in the role. "Want to try something?"

Shiro still look distracted, but whatever he's feeling bleeds into hesitancy, which in turn gives way to curiosity. He nods once solemnly, shakes his head, and then repeats the gesture with renewed enthusiasm and a grin that dazzles.

"Yes."

When Keith leans forward, Shiro doesn't flinch. His jacket creaks, and he's aware that he probably reeks of stale smoke and sweat and the onion bagel he ate before heading out, but Shiro seems unoffended. He follows the movement, bridging the gap between them until Keith can hear the gentle whir of Shiro's bionic hand as it clenches and unclenches. Almost as though Shiro is nervous.

It's the closest that they've been all night, and though Shiro is still a good head taller than Keith, they're practically face to face.

He places his hand on Shiro's neck, both in an effort to anchoring him in place, and pull him closer. Mostly, it's just an excuse for Keith to touch him. "Don't overthink it. Just take a deep breath in when I breath out."

Shiro's pupils are blown wide, and he looks entranced, but it's nothing compared to the dreamy way he says the word "okay."

Keith takes another hit, holds it, then angles his mouth against Shiro's. Their lips are close enough to touch, a whisper apart at most, and when Keith releases the curling smoke on a shuddering outbreath, Shiro breathes him in.

Most of the smoke is lost in the transfer, but, even so, when Shiro's chest rises as he inhales deeply, the movement shrinks the universe. He only coughs a little bit this time, though he tries to stifle it by gnashing his teeth together and shaking his head. It's comical, very nearly bordering on cute.

When it's over, neither of them pull apart.

Keith swears he can feel the microscopic tilt of Shiro's head, the subtle lurch of his chin. It would take nothing for Keith to push forward, press their lips together. If he chose to wet his lips right this moment, his tongue would dart out and lick against Shiro's lips, and maybe the other man would part them and let Keith taste him.

Keith _really _wants to taste him.

They've only just met and yet Keith wants to kiss him with all the enthusiasm of a lovesick teenager.

Feeling brave, Keith lets the joint fall from his fingers. It dies with a hiss as it lands at his feet, a waste of good weed Keith will probably come to regret at some point when he's forced to call up Rolo and part with more cash he doesn't really have, but he can't bring himself to care right now. Instead, Keith settles his now free hand on Shiro's forearm, pleasantly surprised to find it feels even thicker and stronger than it looks. The muscles tense, then almost immediately relax, and it's Keith's turn to jump when he feels fingers curl around the exposed slither of his hip in response. Shiro's thumb presses into the dip just above Keith's pelvis, and that's all the encouragement he needs.

Keith leans into the touch, and though the proximity blurs his vision, he's sure he can see Shiro's eyes flutter closed.

The sound of the back door swinging open separates them before Keith can kiss him. A few partygoers file out, talking amongst themselves with pulled vowels and bodies that sway like reeds in an autumn breeze. The overspill of laughter that leaks into their private world wrenches Shiro back, face burning in a way that damages more than Keith's ego, and his fingers knot in his forelock.

"Fuck, we shouldn't of - _I _shouldn't have…. _Fuck._"

The profanity rolls off of Shiro's tongue strangely, as though it never belonged to him in the first place. A couple of the newcomers look over, and, with the exception of a freshman Keith recognises from one of his classes, who stares at him with a tilt of his head, return to their conversation quickly enough. His classmate – James, maybe? – drags his gaze from Keith to Shiro, and it's only when a semblance of understanding breaks through the alcohol addled haze does he look away with rosy cheeks.

"I should…" Keith begins, rocking back onto his heels. He feels raw and exposed, and the audience forces him to look beyond his rose-tinted glasses and recognise the gulf between himself and Shiro widening with every sobering minute. Shiro looks as though he's fighting a war that Keith doesn't understand, but he does know what regret looks like and he can't stand the similarity. "Don't worry, I won't tell anyone that the Garrison golden child so easily gave into peer pressure. Your secret is safe with me."

"Keith, that's not what I – I didn't mean _that_."

"I know," Keith smiles, and it's small, more than a little self-depreciating, but sincere enough. He starts towards the door but changes his mind and diverts course. Instead, he opts to jump the railings and head towards the promising glow of the streetlamps. Somehow, they seem safer. He'll figure out how to apologise to Pidge later. "I'll see you around."

"Wait!"

It's said a little too loudly, but it's effective in stopping Keith from retreating both literally and figuratively.

"What?"

"I want," Shiro pauses, worrying his bottom lip with his teeth. He looks notably more buzzed now, and Keith can't help but wonder if he was only talking to him in the first place because he was wasted. Keith is so comparatively sober, it almost feels villainous. The kiss would have been a mistake, a terrible idea, and no wonder Shiro is already beginning to regret it, no wonder -

"Can I have your number?" Shiro asks, casually devastating. His flesh hand clutches at Keith's upper arm, but the pressure is pleasant. Too pleasant. Keith suddenly wants to know what it would feel like to have that pressure against his throat instead, and the potency of that particular thought is frightening.

"That's probably not a good idea."

"Why?"

"Why do you even care?"

Shiro looks wounded, and that plucks at Keith's nerves more than the undisguised regret. Keith struggles to reconcile with how a man as big and strong and unashamedly masculine as Shiro can look so small, so helpless. He feels like a monster when Shiro uncurls his fingers and allows his hand to fall limply to his side.

"Look, I… I just don't really do friends." It's not a lie. Keith is a loner by nature, by choice. He didn't come to the Garrison to make friends. He wants to say yes, though. He wants to so fucking bad. Shiro is painful sincerity and starry-eyed idealism somehow conflating together to form a frat brother with an impressive academic record who can smile his way through a 43 second keg stand, but can't handle his smoke.

Shiro is familiar and new all at once, someone Keith wants to explore inside out.

"Then I can be your first," Shiro pleads, mistaking Keith's ruminating for reluctance. He cups Keith's chin with his bionic hand and forces him to meet his eye. People are looking, and he should care. He should really fucking care, but he doesn't. All he can see, and hear, and feel is Shiro. "Please, Keith."

Keith is well and truly fucked.

**.: VII :. **

**[Shiro] [01:18 AM]**

Do you believe in destiny?

**[Keith] [01:18 AM]**

No

** [Keith] [01:19 AM]**

I think we pioneer our own fate. Life is too shitty and unkind to be by design. Even the most malevolent of gods get bored

** [Shiro] [01:19 AM]**

I should have known you'd say something like that

** [Shiro] [01:19 AM]**

We're all just space dust, you know. I think some of us were born from the same fragment of the universe and are meant to find our way back to each other again I want  
**  
[Shiro] [01:20 AM]**

to see the stars. I want to be breathe it all in

** [Shiro] [01:20 AM]**

I couldn't really do it though. I'd miss you

** [Keith] [01:20 AM]**

I'll come with you

** [Shiro] [01:21 AM]**

You'd follow me to the moon? To Pluto?

**[Keith] [01:21 AM]**

Shiro

** [Keith] [01:21 AM]**

I'd follow you to the furthest edge of the universe and beyond

Keith's inexperienced when it comes to cultivating friendships, but he thinks he's doing well enough. They don't talk about the almost kiss. The initial rush of lust settles into something more profound, but no less dramatic, and he's happy enough to let Shiro, the expert, nurture it as he sees fit.

They learn a lot about each other over the course of those first few months.

Shiro learns about his father's untimely death, and the belated return of his mother (who was far too young, too embroiled in the 'wrong-side-of-the-tracks' politics when he was born to think herself worthy of being a mother) into his life. He knows that Keith stews in guilt late at night when he tries and fails to remember the exact sound of his father's voice. He knows that Keith understanding why she left, and forgiving his mother for allowing him to rot in the foster care system between the ages of eight and fourteen, are two entirely separate beasts. He knows that Keith chooses to live with his mother, rather than seek a fragment of independence on campus, to absolve them both.

Shiro knows that Keith isn't sure what he wants to do with his life in the long term, he just knows he doesn't want to stagnate. Knows that he pushes people away to prevent them from leaving on their own terms. Knows that his blossoming friendships with Pidge, Lance and Hunk scare him more than they should because allowing them into his heart gives them the opportunity to hurt him.

Shiro also knows that Keith has trouble sleeping, and so drives out into the desert to chase stars beyond the light pollution. That Keith sometimes falls asleep staring up at the sky, lungs swollen with crisp, cold air. The Keith likes to paint, and draw, and sketch because, while not particularly talented, he finds it easier to express himself through images, rather than words. That Keith hopes Kolivan and Krolia might one day marry, not just for his mother's sake, but for his own. To nurture that spark of yearning for a real family unit, to justify the swell of love he feels for the man who helped raise him from ashes, and taught him how to shave, and helped him patch up his beloved car when he pulled it from the scrap heap. To quietly, silently, _secretly _reacquaint himself with the word 'dad'.

Keith unfurls for Shiro like a flower turning towards the morning sun in spring. Slow, at first, almost reluctant. Then quickly, willingly. Sacrificially.

Shiro, in return, cracks open his own ribcage and offers himself just as willingly.

Like Keith, Shiro is the product of dead parentals.

His mother died before Shiro could form any real memories of her. He lost his father in the car accident that robbed him of his arm at the age of fourteen. In a cruel twist of fate, doctors found the same aggressive bone cancer that had cost his mother her life in his mangled arm, having not yet spread. The surgeon who'd operated had the gall to call Shiro 'remarkably lucky' as he sawed through an additional four inches of an orphaned boy's flesh and bone, changing an elbow disarticulation to a transhumeral amputation as a safety precaution.

The grandparents that raised him after that – who buried their only son as they sat through gruelling physiotherapy sessions and oncological screenings with limited English and rapidly thinning finances – both passed away before Shiro touched twenty.

Reducing the Shirogane family tree to a single, solitary branch.

However, Keith learns Shiro is far from lonely.

Shiro finds his family in the Holts; has known Matt since he was in elementary school, has had his fair share of thanksgiving and Christmas dinners catered for him by Coleen's loving hand. Has tutored Pidge in preparation for entrance exams, and benefited from the one-of-a-kind, state of the art prosthetic that could only ever be a product of Sam Holt's genius and adoration for a boy he unselfishly considers his own.

Keith learns that Shiro has lofty dreams of exploring the cosmos; navigating corners of the galaxy still untouched by humanity's prying eyes, pouring all of himself and more into something bigger than their tiny little lives. He wants to bring life and hope and wonder to the universe.

Shiro's endless capacity for love cannot be contained by the Earth, and so he has to thread it among the stars.

**[Keith] [01:29 AM]**

...shit

** [Keith] [01:29 AM]**

Was that too much?

** [Shiro] [01:32 §AM]**

No, Keith. It was perfect.

Keith also learns, between fits of laughter one terrible spring night as they knock back cheap beers on Keith's porch swing, knees bumping, fingertips brushing, that Shiro has a long-distance boyfriend.

**.: VIII :.**

It's been a strange forty-eight hours, and avoidance has simultaneously always and never been Keith's preferred coping mechanism.

Keith's been careful to remain neutral enough when the faced with prying questions from Allura and Hunk that are decorated with pretty words and terms of endearment to hide their curiosity and sympathy. Even _Lotor _had messaged him, seemingly out of the blue, to ask what he was wearing to the wedding, suggesting that maybe they should all match as a form of comradery. Mostly, Lotor probably just wants a chance to go shopping and max out his father's credit cards, the potential gossip is just the cherry on top of a thousand-dollar cake.

At least when Pidge texts Keith she outright asks if Keith needs some sort of intervention. If she should be worried about him doing a runner, or something equally stupid such as trying to stop the marriage in its entirety (or, as she put it, "_pulling a Julia Roberts a la 'My Best Friend's Wedding_'"). Lance has the good manners to not bring the wedding up at all, instead texting a photo of his ass and asking if his new gym regime is paying off.

Keith's cooking a simple pasta dish - nothing to brag about, but still an achievement for a man who once burnt instant ramen - when the familiar _tap-tap tap tap-tap _at his apartment door startles him into pouring half a jar of tomato and chilli sauce down his chest.

"Shit," Keith hisses, inspecting his braid for damage before tossing it over his shoulder. Louder, Keith adds "give me a minute," as he dabs at the stain and lowers the heat to avoid further disaster. It's unnecessary, though; he knows who's waiting for him on the other side, knows they'll wait patiently for as long as Keith make them

He's pretty sure the pasta is fucked anyway, there's a chance it's already overcooked and gummy, but Keith clings to the hope that he's at least somewhat capable of fending for himself. He is, after all, still alive. Somehow.

The shirt, however, is beyond repair, but Keith's too tired to care.

When he reaches the door and pulls it open Shiro is waiting for him as expected, a beat-up paper bag of pastries in one hand and an empty thermos of coffee in the other. He looks exhausted and slightly dishevelled, but his eyes light up when they meet Keith's.

"Wow, you could have warned me about the bloodbath."

"Sorry. I've been doing some freelance mercenary work on the side and forgot to change."Keith steps aside to let Shiro in, trying to ignore the way that his lips curl up in instinctively whenever he lays eyes on his best friend. "You know I gave you that key for a reason, right?"

"Yup," Shiro beams, lifting the paper bag to shake it at eyelevel. "I brought snacks."

"My hero."

They grin dopily at each other for a few moments too long, Keith's heart rabbiting violently in his chest and a blush, undoubtedly, prickling across the bridge of his nose. Eventually the moment passes, and Shiro steps aside to allow Keith to shut the door behind him. Kosmo raises his head as Shiro walks further into the apartment, his tail thumping happily against the chair he's currently sprawled on. Shiro's hands run through Kosmo's fur, before settling at the spot where his skull meets his ears and scratching hard. One of Kosmo's hind legs twitches on reflex, and he happily chuffs. The traitor.

"How's work?" Keith asks, plucking a chocolate chip cupcake from the paper bag and biting into it.

Shiro groans and pulls a face. "I'm pretty sure I miss Slav's lectures."

"Shiro, no." Keith gasps. While he's known Shiro doesn't particularly enjoy his current job, he had no idea the situation was _that _dire. "I know training recruits isn't exactly your dream job, but I could put in a good word with you at work. We're always in need of people who actually know what they're doing."

"I think you'd get sick of me," Shiro says with a grin, petting the side of Kosmo's neck.

"Yeah, you're right. You're totally last year's news."

"Your words are daggers."

"I'm _kidding_. You bring me pastries and cakes, of course I wont get sick of you."

"So you're using me?"

Keith could spend all evening letting this particular scene play out, but as it stands his shirt is starting to cling coldly to his skin. "Make yourself comfortable. I'm just going to change into something less… gross."

"Wait," Shiro says, before abandoning Kosmo and pulling Keith in for a hug. He smells like earthy deodorant, and salt, and his body is warm and solid against Keith's own. Keith can't help but want to relax and tense simultaneously, though he eventually settles on the latter. His limbs, barely more solid than a jelly, tentatively wrap around the broad scope of Shiro's back, and he is rewarded with a gentle squeeze.

"You'll get tomato blood on your clothes."

"I don't care," Shiro says with a loud exhale, his fingers fisting tightly into the back of Keith's shirt. He clings so tightly, it's almost as if he's afraid to let go. "God, it feels like it's been forever."

"Shiro," Keith chuckles, resisting the frankly embarrassingly juvenile temptation to nose against Shiro's throat. "We hung out on Friday."

"I know. I still missed you."

"You're getting sentimental in your old age," Keith says. He was aiming for teasing, but the words come out moony and Keith can only hope that Shiro doesn't pick up on the pungent desperation that's (always, _always_) rotting away within him.

Keith can feel the upturn of Shiro's lips as he smiles against his hair. "Shut up."

"Why, can't handle the truth?"

"You can be such a little brat sometimes."

It's easy to trick himself into thinking that this is what domestic life with Shiro would be like. Keith welcoming him home from work with open arms and a poorly (but sincerely) cooked meal, Kosmo happily lounging around and waiting for his own greeting. He'd be able to mouth along Shiro's neck, then jaw, until he found Shiro's lips, and then Keith could take-take-_take, _and they could curl up around one another until morning broke the next day. _God, I love you so much_.

He hates that it was a life he'd never get to experience.

When they eventually separate Keith busies himself with changing, grabbing a shirt hanging precariously over the side of the hamper, and tugging his dirtied shirt off and over his head. He can hear Shiro busing himself in the kitchen, presumably trying to salvage the pasta, as though his cooking skills weren't even more abysmal than Keith's.

When Keith returns to the living space, marginally less stain splattered, Shiro is stood at the counter, eyeing the discarded wedding invitation. The contents of his failed cooking venture have been disposed of appropriately, and the pastries that Shiro brought over are neatly laid out on a plate.

"Oh, you got it then," Shiro says passively, picking up the invitation and inspecting it as though it's the first time he's really seen it. Perhaps it is. Shiro's nose wrinkles and he drops it back down, though this time with the front against the countertop, and scratches his cheek. He looks contemplative, almost melancholic, but when he catches Keith's gaze he quickly adjusts his face into a beaming smile. "I thought you would have said something when you did. Unless you don't want to be my best man anymore? I know you said you felt bad, and that Matt should be my best man, but I can't imagine ever getting married without you stood by my side. It just wouldn't be right. You're my best friend."

"It's not that, Shiro. I've been really busy with work," Keith says, gesturing to the pile of papers balanced precariously on the arm of his couch. It's a half lie. Sure, work had been hectic, but that was nothing new. Training up the latest recruits was literally a full-time job, especially given the relative newness of their particular space programme. But that doesn't negate the fact that he's actively ignoring all things wedding related to the best of his ability.

"I know, but" Shiro pauses, looking needlessly guilty. "I guess I just thought you'd tell me. We tell each other everything."

Well, not quite everything.

Keith's throat is dry, and he has to lick his lips and swallow several times to pluck up the ability to speak. Shiro looks so hurt, and it kills him to know he's the one hurting him. _Would Shiro feel the same way if he knew he was hurting Keith? _"It's not your fault, I'm just feeling overwhelmed."

"I know the feeling."

"Shiro, I –"

"Are you going to bring someone to the wedding?" Shiro asks carefully, the words oddly stilted. Keith just about brings himself to meet Shiro's eye, and is puzzled by the strange, guarded expression on his face. Shiro's cheeks bare the slightest pink flush, and his smile is a little wobbly and forced.

"I… I don't know yet. I haven't thought about it."

"That's… fair."

"Do you _want _me to bring someone?" Keith asks, raising his eyebrow. The way Shiro splutters in response is almost endearing, averting his gaze and trying to disguise his discomfort with forced coughing that turns his skin neon red.

"No," Shiro answers far too quickly. "I mean. Maybe? I – I want you to be happy, Keith. You deserve to be so happy. Is there someone?"

Thankfully, Keith's phone skitters across the coffee table, saving him from an emotionally gruelling conversation. He goes over to retrieve it, and he's vaguely aware of the fact that Shiro is following him and lowering himself onto the sofa. Keith knows that Shiro will be expecting an answer, and will hound him about it later, but he also knows that Shiro can read him well, won't press him too much until he considers Keith ready.

**[Griffin] [6:56PM]  
**r u free?

"Adam makes you happy, right?" Keith asks, dragging his eyes away from the screen without typing back a reply.

Shiro briefly looks down at his lap, his fists clenching and unclenching. When he looks up again there's a smile on his face, small and tired, but still there. It feels like a dagger to the chest. "Adam is a good man."

** [Keith] [6:57PM]  
**Give me an hour

**.: IX :. **

Adam Weston is two years older than Shiro, and currently finishing up his Master's in a university several states away. Like Shiro and Keith, they met while the former was in his first year, but unlike Shiro and Keith, they began dating before the autumn semester had even drawn to a close.

"I think you'll like him," Shiro says mid-way through their study session, though he doesn't sound particularly convinced. He scrubs his prosthetic hand through his hair, jostling the pencil tucked behind his ear, and smiles sheepishly. "He's… different, but I really want you guys to get along. You're both so important to me."

Keith hums noncommittally in response, pretending to be far more interested in the (mostly finished) research assignment sitting in front of him, his eyes cosmetically scanning the page, but not focusing well enough to actually read it.

The confirmation that Shiro is gay is hardly surprising, given the events of the party, but the knowledge that Shiro has sucked dick (and would likely continue to suck sick until long after removeable dentures made the slide down much easier) still rattles Keith in a way only several months of pent up wet dreams and guilty masturbation fodder can.

He can admit, at least to himself, that it's the boyfriend thing Keith has an issue with. As impressive as the myth is, Keith can't help but find the man behind Shiro all the more imposing, flaws and all. Being friends with Shiro is more than enough with him. Keith considers himself insanely lucky that someone like Shiro would even give him the time of day. Yet he can't shake the acrid smoke that snakes through his lungs whenever he thinks about Shiro with another man.

"Keith?"

Perhaps it's because he's been nursing something far more insidious than a crush since the moment that they met, or perhaps it's because, with the approaching summer marking Adam's return, it means he's going to have to share Shiro now. He's no longer going to be the priority. He can already feel whatever it is between them slipping; lately Shiro's been distracted and burning with nervous energy, and he's scared to hold on too tightly if Keith's only going to end up disappointed in the long run.

"_Keith._"

Shiro's voice forces Keith to refocus, and he blinks twice to ground himself. The book has been open on the same page for at least twenty minutes, and his notes haven't been added to in just as long. Shiro is staring at him expectantly, his mouth set in a grim line that is only made bearable thanks to the concern in his eyes.

"Yeah?"

"There's something wrong here."

Keith decides to play dumb, twirling a stray pen between his fingers as he shifts notes around. "Is there? I double and triple checked all the data, _and _had Matt give my preliminary notes a once over."

"Don't be a smartass," Shiro sighs, gesturing between the two of them with his bionic hand. With his flesh hand he gently catches Keith's wrist, stilling him, and pressing the pad of his thumb against the veins there. The pressure is both an act of comfort and a thinly veiled warning that settles in the pit of Keith's stomach. "You're distracted."

"I'm studying."

"I feel like you're putting up a wall between us, and I don't like it."

"You're the one building walls, Shiro," Keith retorts, low and sullen. It's an escalation rooted in misplaced sentiment that probably isn't all that true to form, but Keith is too emotionally impoverished to get a real hold on his feelings. Still, he knows that he's talking to Shiro, and he'd rather _try _and talk to him instead of just shutting down. A quarter truth is better than a whole lie. "I guess it bothers me that you couldn't talk to me about Adam. It kind of sucks that you don't trust me enough to even _mention _him."

"Keith," Shiro says in that achingly soft way of his, shoulders falling. The pressure on Keith's wrist increases slightly, and Shiro's thumb sweeps up towards the palm. "It's not like that, I trust you more than anyone else in my life. You mean everything to me."

"Then why didn't you tell me?"

"It's complicated."

It doesn't feel complicated.

Shiro holding back on him for so long doesn't make sense, and Keith can feel his abandonment issues surging. As with friendships, Keith is inexperienced with romantic relationships, but he knows that you should at the very least acknowledge that you have a partner, right? If he meant half as much to Shiro as Shiro did to him, he'd have told him right at the start of their friendship. It probably wouldn't have changed the way Keith felt about him - adoration and respect two sides of the same coin, a coin that Keith flips endlessly - but it would have snuffed out that tiny little spark of hope before it could gain momentum.

"It's fine," Keith says eventually, pulling his hand away and tucking an errant strand of hair behind his ear. "I should probably head back home, I think I'm pretty much done with this project, and I can feel my brain turning into goo."

"It's not fine," Shiro draws in a deep, shuddering breath as if to steady himself. "Keith, I. Things with Adam are different. Being apart from someone for so long changes things, you know? It used to hurt so much, but then it started to get easier. And when I met you, I felt happy for the first time in months, I…"

Shiro wrings his hands as he trails off, looking stricken and incredibly guilty. Keith wants to reach out and take Shiro's hands in his own, tell him it's all going to be alright, but he can't. Instead he waits patiently for Shiro to collect himself and continue.

"I didn't not tell you about Adam because I don't trust you. I didn't tell you about Adam because being with you made me forget about him. When I'm with you, it's just me and you. Adam is just a memory. I know that sounds awful because it _is _awful, but it's true, and I'm sorry. To both of you. This – what I've been doing – isn't fair to either of you. I wish I could make it stop. Take these …thoughts away, but I can't. So I'm sorry, Keith. You deserve the truth, and I couldn't give that to you."

He knows that he should find the confession at least somewhat comforting. Flattering, even. It should ease some of the confused feelings of hurt and betrayal, help him relearn his place in Shiro's life. Instead, it makes Keith feel hollow, confused.

He can't bring himself to lie and tell Shiro that everything's okay, so he says nothing.

**.: X :. **

Adam doesn't like Keith, that much is painfully obvious.

They meet on neutral ground, the entire group present. Lance insists on shooting Lotor filthy looks whenever he thinks the other man isn't looking, and more than once Pidge has had to kick him in the shin to get him to behave. Hunk is cradling a basket of homemade brownies and blondies, while Allura periodically comments on the delicious smell in an attempt to win a favour.

"Is this going to take much longer?" Lotor grouches, swinging an arm over Allura's shoulder. The motion looks casual and unconscious, but the smirk he shoots in Lance's direction suggests that it's anything but.

"It'll take as long as it takes," Keith snaps, despite echoing Lotor's sentiments. He doesn't particularly want to be here, in some dingy park, waiting for his best-friend-slash-unrequited-love-interest to turn up with his _actual _love interest. But Shiro is his best friend and he's been agonising over this meeting ever since he spilled the beans about Adam. Bowing out now simply isn't an option.

When Shiro finally turns up with a slim man at his side, one he introduces as his boyfriend, Adam, Keith feels conflicted. Adam isn't _unattractive. _His skin is rich and dark and blemish free, his hair is shiny and neatly groomed, and his eyes are a pleasant honey colour. But he just doesn't seem like Shiro's type. There's something anachronistic in the prim and proper way he holds himself; Adam's posture is stiff, his mannerisms stiffer still. He reads like a stuffy professor caricature, and Keith had always imagined Shiro with someone far more relaxed and laidback.

"Hello again, Katie," Adam says, offering Pidge a brief smile. Pidge returns the gesture with a thumbs up and a casual hey, apologising for Matt's absence ("_him and dad got caught up with a project and you know how they are._") and for the first time it occurs to Keith that she would have known all about Adam's existence, but failed to pre-warn him. The betrayal stings, but he'll get her back for that another time.

"Shiro was a rather naughty boy," Allura says in that drawl of hers, stepping out of Lotor's reach and playfully elbowing Shiro in the ribs. "He didn't tell us about you—you coming home until right at the last minute, and it caught all of us rather off-guard."

Lance leaps up, animatedly gesturing with no real rhyme or reason. "Yeah, we've been best buds since the first big party of the semester, and he didn't say anything about you until—"

"_Lance_," Pidge says, the tone of her voice a thinly veiled warning. She shoots Adam an apologetic look, but it's lacking the warmth that Keith has come to recognise from her.

"He can be impulsive sometimes," Adam replies in a way that's neither fond nor encouraging. Something about the tone sits poorly with Keith, but he can't tell whether or not he has any justifiable reason to feel prickly, or it's just his bias against anyone who has Shiro rearing its ugly head. Truthfully, he doesn't know enough about relationship dynamics to decipher the potential deeper meaning behind Adam's words.

Shiro is beaming as he walks to Keith's side and firmly plants his hands on his shoulders. "Adam, this is Keith," he says so eagerly, Keith's heart stops beating for a moment. The skin beneath Shiro's palms blooms with gooseflesh, and there's an undercurrent of nervous energy that seeps out of Shiro's body and into Keith's own.

Adam is still polite about it, but he looks Keith up and down in the same way foster parents would look at him when they realised they were getting a brooding, damaged pre-teen and not a giggling little baby they can coddle and call their own. It would be easy enough to miss to the average person, but Keith is well educated in dismissal, knows inherently what it's like to be unwanted and a source of mild repulsion.

"Nice to meet you," Adam says quietly, carefully, outstretching his open palm towards Keith. His lip curls up for a fraction of a second before he adds, voice a little tighter and stare fixated firmly on the hands resting on Keith's shoulder, "Takashi has told me a lot about you."

**.: XI :. [edited] [explicit content redacted] **

Keith collapses backwards onto the bed, gasping for air.

They've come a long way since Keith broke his nose, so much so that sometimes Keith and James feel like entirely different people from the Kogane and Griffin who glared at one another with barely concealed hatred at worst, and glassy-eyed indifference at best.

They're friends now, albeit friends who sleep together when they're lonely or stressed or otherwise bored, and Keith's broadened social circle brings him continuing comfort and support. Something he'd never have thought possible all those years ago. He laughs when Griffin elbows him in the ribs just hard enough to be on the wrong side of playful, and Keith slaps at his shoulder in retaliation. They settle down next to each other, naked and sticky and satisfied.

But then orgasm wears off quickly, as it always does.

He remembers why he's here, why he needed such a hefty distraction. The ghost of Shiro's presence still lingers just beyond his bedroom door, like swirling smoke clinging to Kosmo's fur, and painting a pattern along the furniture. It's most prominent in the wedding invitation, that stupid, _shitty _wedding invitation, and the way it mocks him.

_Adam is a good man. _

Keith eyes Griffin carefully, feeling a little foolish and a lot guilty, before he musters up the courage to speak. Griffin is both objectively and subjectively handsome, all lean muscle and sharp, pointed features. His eyes, dark and deep set, are deceptively soft, especially when focused on Keith, and sometimes Keith can't help but wish that he could feel _that _way about him instead. It would be so much easier.

For everyone.

"I can bring a guest with me to Shiro's wedding."

"Like… a date?" Griffin asks, running a hand through his sex mussed hair. He chews on his bottom lip as though he's nervous, and Keith can't tell if the bead of sweat that dips down into his clavicle is a result of the question or their rigorous workout.

"Hmm," Keith says in lieu of a real confirmation. His heart races in his chest. "You can come with me. If you want to."

Griffin splutters a little, his skin immediately darkening from his hairline to midway down his chest. His eyes bug out a little, and it looks like he's attempting to wrangle back a smile. _He's cute,_Keith thinks to himself. Griffin fucks him with such infallible confidence, it's rather strange to see him falter like an enamoured school girl when confronted with something as simple as a not-date date. "Sure. Uh, yeah. That would be fine."

"Great!"

And then Griffin beams at him, looking happier than Keith has possibly ever seen him, eyes twinkling as they rove Keith's body from top to bottom.

He hates the hope he sees there, hates himself more for cruelly inspiring that hope, and Keith can't help but wonder if that's what he looks like stood before Shiro.

**.: XII :. **

"You sure about this?" Keith asks, locking his fingers together to secure his grip around Shiro's waist. He's shaking, almost violently so, and he can only hope that Shiro is unable to feel it through the layers of leather, or that he attributes Keith's trembling to the brisk early evening air.

They're idling on a cliff edge, the sun just beginning to dip below the horizon and casting strange but beautiful shadows over the desert landscape. It doesn't look real, or, rather, it doesn't look as though it belongs on earth. Colours dance and bleed into one another, the darkest parts of the watercolour sky just starting to freckle with stars. It's easy to imagine getting lost in the hazy romance of it all. Indulgently, Keith clings a little tighter.

Shiro revs the motorcycle's engine, and something instinctual tells Keith that he's smiling. "Don't tell me you're scared?" Shiro asks, cocky. Keith hates how that particular tone, and the arrogant, lopsided smirk that he's imagining, sends his blood rushing south.

"Psh, as if. You're too vanilla to scare me."

Accepting the challenge, Shiro kicks off wordlessly, openly laughing when Keith gasps in mild alarm and tightens his grip. They ride through the desert until everything is draped in darkness, swerving and navigating natural, wind ground paths that any reasonable person would deem far too narrow and fragile for a motorcycle and two grown men.

Keith's glad that they still get to do this.

He'd fully anticipated these late-night adventures fading into memory with Adam's more permanent return, and it bothers him that he'd settled into a happy routine with Shiro when _nothing _about Keith's life suggests that people stay, and getting comfortable results in anything but pain.

"You ready?" Shiro asks as they advance towards the edge of a cliff. There's a neighbouring platform, but it's impossible for Keith to judge the distance like this. It could be two or three feet at most, or it could be twenty. Fifty. A hundred. Hell, the gulf could house the contents of the galaxy for all Keith knows.

He supposes dying doing something stupid with Shiro would be a pretty good way to go.

"Obviously."

Keith fights the urge to squeeze his eyes shut as they hurtle over the edge, and it seems as though they hang in thin air for hours. It's electric; they're free falling through space, darting between stars. Keith can feel Shiro's navel tighten as he takes a deep breath in. Can feel, even though his gloves and Shiro's shirt, the way Shiro's heart thunders in his chest, shaking his whole body. Trembling with promise.

And then, with a bump and a skid, they land.

A giddy, delirious giggle slips out before Keith can even think to contain it. He's still laughing when Shiro kills the engine and they dismount, and he has to unwrap himself from Shiro.

"Oh man," Keith finally says, as he doubles over, clutching at his middle. He looks back at the cliff edge, and a fresh wave of adrenaline rips through him. "I can't believe we made that jump. That was incredible!"

Shiro puffs out his chest, looking proud, and painfully handsome, his hair sweat damp and hanging messily over his face. He's grinning wider than Keith has ever seen him smile, and something warm and pleasant in his chest blooms at the sight of it.

"You have to teach me how to do that," Keith laughs. "_Fuck._"

"I'll do anything you want me to," Shiro replies a little breathy, squeezing Keith's forearm. The touch is comforting, and Keith can't help but lean into it, angling his entire upper body forward and towards Shiro. Perhaps it's a trick of the light, or wishful thinking, but it almost seems as if Shiro does the same.

In no time at all the stars begin to peak out at them from beneath shifting cloud formations, bright and beautiful and unpolluted by the city lights. The temperature has dropped, but Shiro's proximity stops Keith from shivering. Somehow, they've ended up on their backs, sides pressed neatly together as the desert sands stretch out around them. The dust shifts around them like the ocean lapping at the shore; carried by the breeze, speckling red on everything it touches. In the distance, or, perhaps closer than Keith thinks, a coyote lets out a shrill howl.

The world feels as though it's at ease, and Keith almost forgets the true purpose of their trip.

"Do you think we're alone? I know statistically it's unlikely that Earth is the only planet in the universe with intelligent life, but sometimes it feels as though we might be a mistake. A fluke. If there are more planets like ours, why haven't they reached out to us?"

"The Fermi paradox makes for great small talk," Keith teases. "I don't know if aliens exist. Part of me hopes so, but the it's also a frightening thought. If there's another species floating around the cosmos, as violent and self-serving as the human race is, we're all kinda fucked. But…"

"But what?"

"Okay, promise you won't laugh?"

Shiro makes a small 'x' shape over his chest, before clapping his hands together in mock prayer. It's enough to make Keith huff out a fond laugh.

"When I was a kid, before I met my mom, I used to make up stories. She was this brave, strong alien who crash-landed on earth, and my dad found her and looked after her. They fell in love, had me, and then she had to leave to help save the universe from some tyrannical emperor," Keith pauses to collect his thoughts, before adding: "It was easier than acknowledging the possibility that my mom just didn't want me. Space seemed so safe, so reassuring in comparison."

"It is beautiful," Shiro says quietly. Keith glances over, a little taken aback to find Shiro staring intently at him, probably waiting for a response. Keith's tongue feels numb and heavy in his mouth, jaw aching and unwilling to co-operate.

"Yeah."

They're so close, it would take no effort at all for Keith to bridge the gap between them and press his lips up against Shiro's. Shiro's tongue darts out and swipes over his lips almost self-consciously, and it occurs to Keith that he's been caught staring. He reluctantly meets Shiro's gaze, prepared to mutter out an embarrassed apology, but is caught off-guard when he realises Shiro is still staring right back at him, pupils swollen.

But then Shiro blinks and his eyes are normal once again.

It was probably just another trick of the light.

"How long will you be gone?" Shiro asks softly, his flesh thumb swiping tight circles over the back of Keith's hand. The contact makes Keith's skin prickle, and his eyes flutter closed briefly. He thinks he can hear a small, fond chuff, but it's more than likely the wind.

"Most of the summer," Keith answers with a grimace. Truth be told, as much as he wants to help his mother and Kolivan, he finally feels settled, safe, and he's scared that leaving for an entire summer will permanently destroy the life that he's cultivated for himself. He has long since forgiven his mother for being absent, has forgiven his father for playing the hero and getting himself killed, but he can't forget the instability. Abandoning the found family he's carefully opened himself up to feels dangerous, a repeat of history. Though he's aware it's mostly irrational, he can't help but worry that they won't be waiting for him when he comes back. "Mom says the project is a little short on volunteers, so…"

"You're doing a really good thing," Shiro says, gently increasing the pressure on Keith's hand. "I'm proud of you."

"Shut up."

"I'll miss you." Shiro pauses, his face crumpling as though he's experiencing physical pain. On reflex, Keith squeezes his hand, trying to ignore the way his own throat is growing itchy. Shiro shifts a fraction closer and, _fuck, _they're practically nose to nose. Keith can feel Shiro's breath fanning against his lips, can count the flecks of grey in Shiro's eyes. He wants to kiss him, wants to kiss him so bad, as bad as he did the day they first met, as bad as every single other day after. "God, I'm going to miss you so much. It's not like it was with me and Adam. Losing you is going to feel like… like I've lost a part of myself. I'm going to be counting down the days until you come home."

Keith doesn't know how to handle that information, struggles to work out what that might mean. He wants to be able to read into it, wants to be able to let himself believe that Shiro is trying to tell him that he feels the same way, but the logical, clinical part of Keith's brain knows he's just projecting his own feelings and trying to placate his own desires. Shiro is his best friend, Shiro has a boyfriend.

Selfishly, he wants to beg Shiro to come with him. To blow off his summer plans, blow off Adam, and join the Marmora programme with him. Maybe he could make Shiro fall in love with him. Maybe they could be happy.

Or, maybe Keith's too old for childish daydreams.

"Yeah, I'm going to miss you too."

**.: XIII :.**

Keith's phone pings on his bedside table, startling him out of a light slumber, and after a few moments he gropes blindly for it from the comfort of his bed. His shoulders pop a little, and his muscles are sore, but Keith grins and bears the mild discomfort.

After all, burning muscles due to sexual satisfaction are preferable to being needlessly woken up at god only knows what hour.

He ought to be used to it by now – Keith's friends are equal parts selfish assholes with no sense of appropriate boundaries, and endearing assholes who, for some unknown reason, seem to want to share the best and worst parts of their lives with Keith at any given time. He forgives any and all intrusions, anything that might irk him or test the limits of his patients, because he loves them. The universe was kind enough, after a lifetime of loneliness, to present him with a family of his own making. Even if that family is invasive and annoying.

**[Shiro][3.41am]  
** I saw this and though of yo

** [Shiro][3.41am]**

**you

The attached photo is groan inducing: a sickly, saccharine photo of a cat with an expression that can only be described as grumpy, its forepaws wrapped around the neck of a sleeping dog. In contrast to the cat, the dog's expression is blissed out, even in slumber. Despite himself, Keith has to bite down on his lower lip to suppress a smile.

** [Keith][3.43am]**

If I'm the cat whos the dog?

The three dots indicating that Shiro is typing a reply flicker in and out of existence several times, as though multiple messages were being deleted and quickly re-written. It's a challenge to stay awake long enough to avoid missing it; Keith is emotionally exhausted and his impromptu not-date night with Griffin wore him out physically.

** [Shiro][3.45am]**

Me?

Keith's heartbeat thumps loudly in his ears in response, an off-rhythm tempo that makes his bones feel as though they're shaking, and his breath quicken. It's really not fair of Shiro to say things like that, even if his best friend doesn't mean it like _that_, and is totally oblivious, somehow, to the massive crush that Keith has been nursing for the last six and a half years.

** [Keith][3.49am]**

Youre so lame

** [Keith][3.49am] **

Why are you even up?

**[Shiro][3.49am]**

Couldn't sleep

** [Shiro][3.50am]**

Keep thinking about you

Keith's heart stops momentarily, and he re-reads the text once, twice, and third time more to make sure he's not just seeing or misreading things. He wants to say something utterly ridiculous and self-destructive like "_I can't stop thinking about you either_", or "_Shiro, I'm so hopelessly in love with you that, most of the time, you're __**all**__I think about_". Keith could tell Shiro that it would always be him, and while the realisation was gutting, it also stills something within Keith; the knowledge that, no matter what, no one else will be able to break his heart like this. No one else can clutch his soul in their hands and yank it apart. That however much it hurts now, however much he wishes he was Adam, no one else can ever hurt Keith the way that Shiro accidentally does. That Keith is, in this regard, safe.

Keith doesn't know how to quantify his feelings into something remotely palatable, into something he feels that Shiro, his best friend _Shiro-with-a-fiancé-and-a-wedding-on-the-horizon, _would be able to digest, so he defaults to silence. It makes his heart rattle against the confines of his ribcage.

He lets his phone fall onto the bed next to him, and hopes that Shiro will interpret the lack of response as Keith having merely fallen asleep.

As it is, Keith doesn't sleep a wink that night.

**.: XIV :. **

"Wow, Keith. _Dude,_" Hunk says, letting out a long, drawn out whistle, and Keith can't help but flush at the unexpected attention. Hunk has always been eager to hand out praise to anyone he deems deserving (which, in Hunk's world, is pretty much everyone), but this kind of flattery is different, and it makes Keith's insides squirm. He feels like he's been put under a microscope, and there's nowhere for him to hide. "Were you gone a few months or a few years? 'Cause you're, like, super buff now."

"It's not _that _impressive," Lance grumbles defensively, crossing his arms over his chest, his bottom lip jutting out. "I could totally do the same if I wanted to."

"You wish," Pidge snorts. "If Old Keith could kick your ass, then New Keith could give Shiro a run for his money. I'm pretty sure I could grate cheese on Keith's bare abs."

"Please don't."

"Do you think you could do sit-ups with me sat on your back? Do you think you could do sit-ups with me _and _Allura sat on your back?"

"_Pidge._"

Keith isn't oblivious to the slight physical changes his body has gone through over the summer, if only because they've altered the way his clothes fit. He's gained a little bit of muscle from working with the Blades to put together the community centre, his skin tanned from long days working in the summer sun. He's, somehow, grown an inch or so, but not enough for it to be that noticeable, or so he thought.

But the reaction to his homecoming has been a lot more intense than Keith thought it would be, Pidge scrambling to prod against his biceps and even lift up his shirt to poke at his stomach, while all eyes were locked on him.

Shiro is staring, mouth gaping slightly. There's something weighty in the gaze, something that hooks its claws in and under Keith's skin. It makes Keith's heart skip erratically, the sound of blood rushing in his ears. He _wants _to interpret it as longing, but he knows better. Whatever it is, though, Keith thinks he likes it.

"You look …good," Shiro finally says, voice tight and just a little bit off. He swallows, but the motion is exaggerated, and his eyes continue to roam all over Keith's body.

"Good? That's the understatement of the century," Hunk says, circling around Keith. "You look like the after shot in one of those training montages in action movies, y'know? Like when they need to gear up for a big fight, or to save some patch of land in a competition before it gets gentrified? That's you, dude. You're Rocky, Keith. You're Mulan at the end of '_I'll Make a Man Out of You_.'"

"It's nothing, really," Keith mutters, scratching the back of his head. He's suddenly hyperaware of the way his shoulders roll with the moment, how he navel draws in, and his embarrassment grows. More than anything, he's still so very aware of Shiro's eyes, piercing, lovely, devouring him. "Don't make a big deal out of it."

"I think your transformation is very praise worthy," Allura says, giving his arm an affectionate squeeze. There's something about her tone, misleadingly sweet to mask an undertone of something dangerously close to _sneaky, _that sets Keith on edge, and he eyes her warily. "The dedication it must have taken is inspiring, truly, and a real testament to the hard work you have put in while helping others. Wouldn't you agree, _Shiro_?"

"Keith, I, uh, everyone, we need to get going if we want to grab food," Shiro says, a faint flush of pink riding high on his cheekbones. The gang murmurs in quiet agreement, and, thankfully, the conversation turns away from Keith's abs and towards tacos, and sub sandwiches, and whatever substantially less trashy cuisine Hunk is trying to push. Keith permits himself a small smile. One that only grows wider as Shiro takes a small step forward. He reaches out and rests his metal hand on Keith's shoulder, gives it an affectionate squeeze.

"I really missed you," Shiro says, voice subdued and thick with emotion. Shiro wavers just a little, and his hand slides up to the curve of Keith's throat, thumb affectionately tracing the outline of Keith's jaw. Keith lets out a shaky breath, and he can't fight the involuntary way his eyes flutter closed.

Shiro's thumb grows a little bolder, roams a little further, sweeps across Keith's bottom lip and lingers. "I missed you too."

**.: XV :. **

"Welcome ladies, gentlemen, and Lance," Coran greets cheerfully, ignoring Lance's indignant and pointed _'hey!'_. "It must be, what, five or six pheobs since the gang was all here. I was starting to suspect some sort of foul play."

The seven of them are all crammed into a booth at Coran's, Keith wedged tightly between Shiro and Pidge. He's pretty sure that, given the way Pidge is lying against it, his arm has gone numb, and the thigh that's pressed up against Shiro's feels prickly and a little sweaty, but it's a nice change of pace to have the whole gang together again. It reminds him of their college days.

"Has it really been that long?" Allura asks, looking aghast. She's the only one who seems to understand the endless streams of gibberish that make up Coran's language, a fact that both marvels and scares Keith. "It must have been. The last time we all got together we were celebrating Hunk's promotion, and that was, what, six months ago?"

From across the table, Lance picks up a napkin and starts shredding the corner of it. "I saw a tweet once that described adulthood as an endless cycle of trying to make plans with your friends, but all of your schedules conflict until the day you die. Seems pretty on point."

Allura pouts, dropping her chin into her palm, and propping her elbows up on the table. "Well, that's just depressing."

Keith can't help but feel a little guilty. He hasn't made as much of an effort as he probably should have, throwing himself into work and at Griffin to distract himself from Shiro's upcoming nuptials. It's easier to pretend to be happier for Shiro that way, or at least that's what Keith tells himself. He _is _happy for Shiro. Acknowledging that his best friend is in a healthy, committed relationship that brings him joy, and mourning for the loss of a one-sided relationship that only ever existed in Keith's head aren't mutually exclusive.

Being friends with Shiro is enough. It's fulfilling, and wonderful, and one of the greatest joys in Keith's life.

But it's still just a band aid over a septic wound.

Coran takes their orders with practiced ease, and when Keith catches a glimpse at the man's memo pad he's unable to make out the chicken scratch. It looks more like a series of strange but simple hieroglyphics, and it's not a language that Keith has ever seen before, but Coran has never gotten an order wrong, so he dismisses whatever doubts are starting to germinate.

"Are you feeling better after your emotionally fraught outing a few weeks back, boys?" Coran asks suddenly, tucking the orders into the pocket of his apron, pointedly looking between Keith and Lance. Keith freezes, feeling like a deer trapped in headlights, and he regrets having ever agreed to breakfast.

"Wait, what happened a few weeks ago?" Shiro asks, frown forming. Keith's lips part in an attempt to defend himself, but no words are able to come out, so he ends up gawping uselessly. "Is everything okay? Keith, are _you _okay?"

"Everything is fine, buddy," Lance lies smoothly, making a dismissive gesture with one hand. He briefly glances Keith's way, but doesn't let the look linger, and in response fondness fizzes in Keith's chest. For all the shit he gives Lance (and the shit Lance gives him in return), there's a certain ride-or-die quality to their friendship, and Keith's glad to have him on his side. "I was in a bit of a gastric jam and Keith, my shining knight and valiant hero, came to my rescue."

"Oh, okay," Shiro says a little sceptically, brows knitting together.

Thankfully, the subject is dropped as soon as Coran walks away to prepare their food. While Keith still occasionally catches Shiro looking at him, he doesn't try and probe to find out more. Instead, Lotor launches into a flourishing rant about his asshole father and largely distant mother, which eventually fades into Hunk and Pidge arguing about modulating something-or-other, while Lance brags about his _Battle Cats _skills. Keith is grateful for the distraction, and even finds himself adding little snippets of commentary every now and again.

Soon enough, Coran returns with their food. He lingers a little while after he delivers the last plate, twirling his moustache between his thumb and forefinger. "So, Shiro, when's the big day?"

Shiro blinks rapidly, noisily sucking in the piece of bacon dangling between his lips. "Uh, eight? Yeah, the wedding is about eight weeks from now."

"Gosh, the excitement must be kicking in," Coran says. "Though I must say I am disappointed that I wasn't asked to cater the wedding."

"Sorry, Coran. Adam insisted we use the same company that catered his sister's wedding. Apparently the crab tian was to die for."

This answer seems to placate Coran, and he eventually leaves the group to eat their breakfasts undisturbed. Keith picks at his usual order, mostly watching the others tuck into their equally as unhealthy dishes, until he can't take it anymore.

Keith nudges Shiro with his knee, his voice low and quiet as he speaks. He doesn't want the others to hear him, even though he knows that they likely will anyway. "You hate shellfish."

Shiro pauses in his chewing, looking a little flustered and taken aback. "Weddings are about compromise"

"I know but _you _need to enjoy it too," Keith presses.

Shiro lowers his gaze to his plate, his jaw clenching momentarily. "Can we talk about something else, please?"

**.: XVI :.**

Keith barely eats, rarely sleeps.

Every part of him hurts, and the pain kills his appetite, leaves him writhing in a sweaty tangle of sheets at night.

Keith lies to his mother on the phone or during one of their dinners, but he can tell she sees right through them in the way Kolivan texts him at least once a day to check in, and the extra groceries they send him home with.

_Eight weeks._

It's been a while since he was this sick – sixteen years, give or take – but he remembers the symptoms well. It's the sour, curling smoke and stench of damp wood. The weight of a mangled helmet placed into the open palms of a sobbing child. An entire galaxy tucked into cardboard boxes; a wooden blackhole and marble epitaph where the sun once shone.

It's a monochromatic piece of paper and a set of matching gold rings.

It's denial. It's guilt. It's anger. It's loneliness. It's acceptance. It's eight weeks. Eight _fucking _weeks.

**.: XVII :. **

"Dude, you suck," Lance grouches as Keith yanks the final slice of pepperoni from under his fingertips and licks a possessive stripe along the cheap meat and coagulating cheese. There's a slither of satisfaction from riling Lance up that hasn't never dulled or died no matter how much time passes, and Keith is glad for the consistency in their friendship.

"You snooze you lose."

Lance pulls a face and settles for a slice of the much less coveted anchovy and caper pizza that Hunk had insisted upon, artfully picking off any chunks of vegetable and fish that happen to offend him. Which is pretty much all of them.

"You're heartless," Lance says, the hurt in his voice only partially feigned, taking a huge bite out of his bastardised slice. "You're heartless and I don't know why I keep hanging out with you."

"Living together kinda forces us all to hang out," Hunk muses, tapping his finger against his chin. "It's a necessary evil that comes with wanting to make rent. It's the only reason we tolerate you, buddy."

"I'm feeling very attacked right now," Lance whines. "If anyone's disposable, it's Keith. What does he bring to the table? A mullet and a faux 1992 punk meets 2003 emo hybrid personality. Spare me the grandiose New Romantic bullshit. Without me you guys wouldn't have a leg to stand on. I'm the devilishly handsome glue that holds this entire Breakfast Club operation together."

"Not so much the glue, but more a piece of gum someone stepped in accidentally, ended up getting matted in the carpet that we're just too broke to replace," Pidge says, sipping on the beer she's technically too young to be drinking. Lance gasps theatrically, and Keith has to press the heel of his palm against his lips to stifle a full-blown belly laugh. "Stop pulling pigtails, if you want his dick man up and ask. One quick hate fuck, and we can all move on with our lives."

"Pfft, he wishes I was interested his dick," Lance says, kicking out towards Pidge. She nimbly dodges his attack, and, foiled by his own basketball shorts, Pidge responds with a vicious pinch to the flesh of Lance's thigh. "Just for that, I'm telling your mom. Coleen loves me, and wouldn't stand for such vicious harassment."

Hunk tilts a beer to his lips and smiles. "Oooh, bringing out the big guns."

"They don't call me the Sharp Shooter for nothing."

"Literally no one calls you that."

"Yeah, but you _could_."

The sound of raised voices from the floor above the cleaves through the feather-light mood.

_"Adam, wait."_

Lance, Hunk, and Pidge wince in unison as a bedroom door slams open and into the wall. Allura tucks herself further into the armchair her and Lotor are crammed into, and Keith can't make out whatever it is she mumbles to her boyfriend. The tone, at least, drips with concern, and Lotor responds by planting a small, reassuring kiss against her temple.

Keith doesn't flinch, instead staring into his own beer bottle as he wills himself not to rise to his feet and rush to the defence of his best friend. He still doesn't like Adam, but nor does he particularly dislike him. Keith cares about very few people enough to actually _feel _anything for them, positive or negative. It's his unwavering love for Shiro that keeps him rooted in place. Keith knows it's not his place to intervene with Shiro and Adam's relationship.

"No, Takashi. I've done nothing _but _wait. I am not an infinite well of patience," Adam's voice travels easily through the thin walls of their shared student accommodation, and there's a desperate tone there that's huddled beneath the frustration. "Is your dream really more important than us? Than me?"

"Why can't I have both? Why are you making me choose? You got to have your dream. When you wanted to move _seven hours away _to get your Master's degree, I encouraged you. When you took that internship and missed my birthday _and_ our anniversary, I understood. Why is it so hard to even _pretend _to support me?"

"Because it's never going to happen, Takashi! You're an amputee and cancer survivor. We both know the statistics when it comes to recurrence and development of secondary cancers. You're a ticking time bomb. I can't stand by and watch you waste what little life you may have on a silly fantasy that will _never _come true."

"Why is it so hard for you to believe in me? To have some faith that maybe, just maybe, I'm going to be healthy and growth old? Why can't you encourage me, Adam? Why can't you be more like—"

"More like _Keith?_" Adam finishes for him. For as long as Keith has known him Adam has always been so calm, collected. But the mordacious edge to his voice is unmissable, and Keith feels a shiver work its way down his spine.

"Not this again"

"Oh, shit," Pidge whispers. "Oh shit, oh shit, oh _shit_."

With remarkable subtly, Lance squeezes Keith's elbow. It's a reassuring gesture that doesn't bring any additional attention to Keith, and while it's appreciated, it doesn't lessen the way Keith's heart thunders in his chest. Nor does it quell the heat that creeps from his clavicle to his hairline.

"_Again_?" Lotor's amusement is obvious, the outer edges of his lips twitching obnoxiously. Keith kind of wants to punch him in his smug, smarmy face, but that would involve moving. As it is, mortification has frozen him in place. Taking pity on him, Allura slaps at Lotor's chest on Keith's behalf, whispering a harsh "_stop it!"_

"We wouldn't keep having this argument, if you didn't keep running off with _him, _instead of building a life with me, Takashi. God, do you think I'm an idiot? I'm well aware of the frankly ridiculous things you get up to when you're with _him_."

"Adam, he's my best friend," Shiro cries, voice worn rough and thick with emotions. Keith lets out a shaky breath, hands trembling around his beer bottle. He can feel the others' eyes on him, but he refuses to look up from his lap. "You don't have an issue with me hanging out with Matt, or Lance, or any of the others."

"Because they're not in—" Adam cuts himself off, and Keith's stomach drops to his feet. For an awful, horrible moment, it's almost as if Adam_knows_. His veins thrum, aching and swollen with fear, and Keith can only selfishly hope that _if _Adam does know, he won't spill the beans and ruin his friendship with Shiro. "They're not as impulsive and reckless as he is."

"Don't talk about Keith like that. He's my best friend."

"Does _he _know that?"

"We should study," Keith says tersely, unable to bear it anymore. He can't stand the heavy gazes ripping chunks out of his skin, can't stand the raised voices bouncing off of the walls, and the insides of his skull. He needs a distraction, or else he's going to vomit, or worse.

"Yeah man, sounds like a good idea," Hunk replies a little too loudly, pushing up from his chair to retrieve a folder from his messenger bag. "I have, like, three different tests coming up and a paper due soon."

"You're a secret academic enthusiast, and I hate you for it," Lance grumbles, but it's all for show. Keith doesn't miss the way Lance's eyes slide from the ceiling to him and back again.

And he certainly can't ignore the pity.

**.: XVIII :.**

Because Fate habitually toys with Keith in the most emblematic ways, his car breaks down a handful of weeks before the wedding.

Red is a would-be relic from his childhood, the car his father always wanted but couldn't justify buying. Not when he had to prioritise the practicalities of raising a child alone. They'd spent Keith's formative years talking endlessly about buying a wreck of a car and building it up themselves, but his death had put a stop to that. Still, the idea had embalmed itself, and so, after reuniting with his mother, Keith had spent whatever time and money he had (Kolivan had gifted him with a fancy new muffler one Christmas, and Keith has unashamedly sobbed) turning an old banger destined for the scrapyard into something road worthy, while his father's memory sat gently on his shoulders.

The benefits of having two engineers within his found family saves Keith a healthy sum, but Hunk and Pidge can only work so fast, especially given their already busy schedules, and with work to get to and bills to pay, Keith has no choice but to mooch rides from anyone willing to give him one.

Predictably, Shiro comes to his rescue.

Which is how Keith finds himself in the passenger seat of Shiro's car after work, as Shiro belts out David Bowie.

"_I had to phone someone so I picked on you,_" Shiro sings, mouth curving up. He glances at the road quickly, before semi-blindly reaching with his right arm to prod at Keith's ribs. The movement is too light and playful to hurt, but Keith finds himself trying to squirm away from the contact anyway, huffing out laughter as he squashes himself against the car door. "Come on, Keith, I know you know the words."

"I'm _not _singing."

"We both know you want to."

Keith protests for a few moments more, lips petulantly sealed tight, but then the chorus sneaks up, and he can't help but sing along.

"_There's a starman waiting in the sky, he's told us not to blow it 'cause he knows it's all worthwhile.."_

Their duet is a little off-harmony, but it still sounds surprisingly well practiced. Keith reaches for the dial to turn it up just as Shiro does, their fingers accidentally brushing. It's such a casual touch, but it makes Keith's heart trip over itself, and he can feel his neck and face growing warm. He opens his mouth to apologise, but Shiro beats him to it, stuttering out an awkward, out of character "sorry" that forces Keith to turn and look at him.

Shiro is beautiful. The oranges of evening sunlight filtering in through the window accentuates all of his best features, and he looks ethereal. His left hand grips the steering wheel just a little too tight, knuckles bright white, and his cheeks are a pretty pink colour that stands out against the stark bright white of his scar. He's boyish in a way that really shouldn't still be possible at twenty-six.

"Do you ever think about getting married, Keith?" Shiro asks abruptly, voice a little airy and soft. Bowie melts into the background, drowned out by the purr of the engine, the rumble of rubber on dust and dirt and tar, the off-rhythm tempo of Keith's pulse in his ears.

"Sometimes," Keith admits truthfully.

"What's it like? Your dream wedding, I mean."

Keith scrubs at the back of his neck, feeling a little awkward. Every one of his wedding fantasies involve Shiro as his groom, and it feels like he's playing a dangerous game with their friendship by spilling at least some of the beans. "I guess I'd just want something quiet. Just family and my closest friends. Nothing fancy. A quiet ceremony out by my dad's old shack. A little party afterwards. Camping out under the stars with yo—my husband for our honeymoon."

"Yeah?" Shiro asks, voice sounding a little moony. "That sounds perfect, Keith."

Keith snorts, pulling up his legs and fiddling with the frayed fabric at the knee. "Shiro, I'm not going to be offended if you think it's lame. It's not exactly the big fairy tale most people dream about."

"Honestly? It sounds wonderful. You could have it around dusk, the sun setting as you say your vows. Your first dance by moonlight, a bonfire crackling in the background. God, I miss our bike rides out in the desert. We should go again, sometime soon."

Warmth blooms in Keith's chest, and he can't stop the frankly goofy smile that steals across his face. "I'm not sure about the dancing, but everything else sounds great."

"C'mon Keith, you've got to dance at your wedding."

"I don't know how."

"I'll teach you," Shiro says, reaching out one hand to affectionately squeeze Keith's shoulder.

"You know how to dance?" Keith snorts. For as long as they've known each other, Keith's never seen Shiro dance. The idea inspires two separate images; one of Shiro awkwardly fumbling around, breaking out some terrible dad-dance moves; the other is of Shiro slow dancing, pressed tightly against his partner's body. Keith tries, valiantly, to picture Adam as Shiro's partner, but despite his best efforts he takes Adam's place.

"Frankly I'm hurt and offended by the implied accusation," Shiro says with a light laugh. "I'll have you know I'm a brilliant dancer."

"We'll see at your wedding."

Not for the first time, Shiro's nose wrinkles at the mention of his wedding, and he pulls his hand away. The mood shifts abruptly, and Keith can't help but feel as though he's missing something. Ordinarily, Keith would probe and ask questions, but discussing the wedding (and potentially Shiro's feeling about the wedding) is akin to prying open his own ribcage. For the sake of self-preservation, Keith keeps quiet and tries to focus on the way Bowie croons at him through the radio.

_"I'm floating in the most peculiar way, and the stars look very different today – "_

The final vestiges of sunlight begin to dip below the horizon, permitting the dark of night to swell and blanket the sky. Keith is suddenly struck by the memory of his father; of cruising home late at night, staring up at the stars as his father speaks fondly of his mother, tracing constellations and praying she'll come home to them soon.

The longing still makes his heart hurt, but it's no longer for Krolia. It's not even for his father. Instead it's a longing for something that's simultaneously familiar and not. For something threaded among the constellations – visible, but out of reach. His limbs tremble and ache with want, fingers blindly curling and uncurling as if trying to gain purchase or hold onto the invisible, nameless thing.

_"– planet Earth is blue and there's nothing I can do." _

Keith slides Shiro a side eyed glance, and the feeling stubbornly stays put.

Defeated, Keith drags a hand through his bangs before propping himself up against the car door, chin resting firmly in his palm. They don't speak, but he notices Shiro occasionally peak his way every so often, lips turned down in an unhappy frown. It feels like this is becoming a regular occurrence – Shiro tensing up and shutting down, spilling into silence, the miserable pull of his mouth.

It hurts.

Eventually they pull up outside of Keith's apartment complex, and he feels guilty for the rush of relief he experiences. "Thank you," Keith says, reaching for the door handle. "I'm sorry for making you do this, hopefully Red will be up and running again soon."

"Keith, is everything okay? You haven't been yourself lately, and I'm worried about you. If you're sick, or there's something wrong, you'd tell me, right?" Shiro's concern is palpable but not palatable. The hypocritical edge to it coats Keith's tongue in an unpleasant film, but he doesn't quite know how to transfer his frustrations and injured heart into words. Shiro lunges across the centre console, hand finding the back of Keith's neck, and pulling him forward until their foreheads are pressed firmly together. Keith feels, rather that sees, the way Shiro's eyes screw shut and his eyebrows pull together. "I'm suffocating, Keith. I'm doing all the things I apparently _should _be doing, and I still can't get what I want. I don't know what do. I don't know how much more I can sacrifice. If I do the right thing, I suffer. If I do the wrong thing, so many other people suffer."

"I don't understand," Keith says, a frantic undercurrent tinging his voice. "What's happened, Shiro? Please. You're not making any sense."

Shiro chuckles mirthlessly, combing a hand through his bangs. "I feel like I'm losing you and I don't know what to do. I love you so much, Keith. I don't want this distance between us. I want _you, _Keith. You're my wor- you're my best friend. I love you."

"Of course," Keith's stomach lurches, but the lie still slips out easily enough. How staunchly Shiro views him as nothing more than a friend, albeit his best friend, is a punch to the gut. Shiro has no idea how badly he's taunting Keith, how he's dangling a carrot in front of his face, just with his proximity. In an ideal world, Keith would be able to close the distance and he might dare to kiss to Shiro, invite him up to his apartment, tumble into his bedroom.

Reality is a sharp scratch as the needle pierces skin. It's a heady dose of unrequited love that coagulates blood, and kickstarts a fever.

Self-preservation kicks in, and he pushes away from Shiro, forcing an approximation of a smile as Shiro chases the contact, clearly eager to shelter and protect Keith. To be his _best friend_.

"Keith…" Shiro says his name breathlessly,

"There's nothing to worry about."

**.: XIX :. **

Shiro drops a bombshell as they devour Happy Meals on a Tuesday night.

"I think I'm going to break up with him."

Keith drops the fries he had been attempting to shovel into his mouth, and blinks rapidly. He's sure he's misheard Shiro, and wipes grease on his thighs. "Wait, what?"

"I said I think I'm going to break up with Adam."

"Shiro, this is huge," Keith says, eyes going wide. Part of him, selfish and needy, wants to rejoice, but the larger part, the part of him that is content to love Shiro in any capacity, is overwhelmed with concern. "Did something happen? Did he cheat on you? Has he hurt you?"

Shiro huffs out a small laugh, but it's self-deprecating and humourless. "No, nothing like that."

"Then what's wrong?"

"We've been arguing all the time, and he's on my case about my plans after graduation. We're so different. But it's not just that, I've been _feeling _something different lately, and it's making me think that maybe Adam isn't the one for me, If _maybe…_" Shiro glances Keith's way, eyes pleading with him for some sort of understanding or reassurance. Keith's breath hitches in his throat, and all attempts at coherency fly out of the window. When the pause drags on far too long, Shiro palms at the back of his neck with a defeated exhale. "It doesn't matter."

Shiro looks so sad and defeated, and Keith plants his hands on either side of Shiro's face, running his thumbs along Shiro's cheeks. They catch slightly on the corners of his scar, but Shiro doesn't seem to mind. In fact, he almost seems to _enjoy _the contact, leaning into it and closing his eyes.

"Keith, I…" Shiro starts, nuzzling against the palm of Keith's hand like a touch starved cat. He's shaking, just a little, clearly wound up and fragile. Keith's heart wants to be fragile; a flower with delicate petals that bend easily in the breeze, when it should be ferocactus. Keith is a child of the desert, he can't allow his feelings to flower and bloom if they're only going to end up shrivelled and scorched beneath an unforgiving sun. "I need to tell you some—"

"Don't worry about it. You know I'll stand by you, whatever you decide. _I love you,_" Keith blurts out. He hadn't meant for it to sound so woefully tragic and pathetic, aiming less for lovelorn teenager, and more for supportive best friend, and it's just a little too close to a real confession for his liking. He quickly amends that with, "you're my brother."

Shiro flinches like a wounded animal, his mouth turning down and his eyebrows drawing together. He doesn't open his eyes, though. If anything, they seem to screw shut a little more. "Huh. Your brother," Shiro says carefully, tone neutral. "Okay."

**.: XX :.**

**[Keith][11.22pm]**

THESE KIDS ARE GOING TO KILL ME

** [Keith][11.23pm]**

I stg im going to launch myself off of the nearest building

**[Keith][11.23pm]**

Please don't let any of them come to my funeral

Weeks drip by like a leaky faucet. Between messages ranting about the stubborn (and, for some, frankly hopeless) new cadets that they're supposed to be training, Griffin sends Keith dirty pictures and Keith spells out every single way he wants Griffin to wreck him. Sometimes, when Keith is feeling particularly desperate, and, after they've spent the better part of an hour teasing one another, he'll call Griffin, just to hear the other man pant his name down the phone.

It helps him blot out the asteroid that's hurtling towards him.

Keith's self-aware enough to know he's spiralling, and what he's intentionally doing to Griffin is much worse than what Shiro is accidentally doing to him, but if he stops, if he lets himself stagnate and think, then he's going to backslide. Keith can't inoculate against his feelings, and while he's been happy to love Shiro in the one way he's allowed to, marriage inspires a hoard of abandonment issues he's never had the capacity to deal with.

** [Shiro][11.24pm]**

As if I'd let anything happen to you

**[Shiro][11.24pm]**

If you fall, I'm coming with you

**.: XXI :.**

Adam proposes at Shiro's graduation ceremony, one month after Shiro's McDonald's catered confessional.

Shiro's barely finished his walk, his cap and gown still pristine and unruffled due to posing for photographs, degree freshly in hand, when they all greet him. Keith's not sure he's ever felt this proud of anything or anyone in his life. Shiro has overcome so much, has spent his entire life fighting. He wonders if his own graduation is going to feel quite so poignant, if people are going to be just as proud of him, and he leans into Allura's touch when she opens her arms to him.

Then Adam's hand twitches towards his pocket, and Keith can see the nervous hitch and bob of his throat as he sinks to one knee.

"Takashi," Adam starts, voice steady but tight. "I have something important that I want to ask you."

"Oh shit," Matt whispers, reaching out to clutch at Pidge's shoulder and steady himself. "Here's to the slow euthanasia of Shiro's sex life."

"No way. No freaking way," Hunk says at the same time, looking mildly horrified. Allura's grip on Keith tightens just a little bit, but he barely feels it. His lungs are screeching for air, and his hands shake violently by his side. All Keith can do is look on in horror.

It seems like the entire graduating class and accompanying guests are staring, and Shiro's skin is burning hot. His eyes immediately snap up to find Keith, looking vulnerable and, frankly, terrified. It's almost as though he's pleading with Keith to rescue him from this situation, as though there were any way to actually do so. Keith thinks Adam should know better, should know that even though Shiro is authoritative and exceedingly popular, he's also private and hates being the centre of too much attention. Part of him is angry that Adam has bogarted Shiro's day, making something that was supposed to be a symbol of Shiro's enduring hard work, and making it about _them _as a couple.

If Keith were the one proposing, he'd have taken Shiro out into the desert late at night with a picnic of all their favourite foods. They'd have watched the sun dip below the horizon, counted the stars blossoming across the sky, and, as Shiro traced his favourite constellations, Keith would have pulled out the ring (a simple, small black diamond, flush set in a gold band) and asked.

But Keith isn't the one proposing.

Shiro sucks in a deep breath, smile tight and cheeks flaming red, and says "okay."

**.: XXII :. **

It's raining; fat, heavy drops that land on the roof of the Holt's garage-turned-Pidge's-private-workshop and echo throughout the room. Petrichor clings the roof of Keith's mouth, hot and wet and invading, mixing with the stench of oil and rust to sit heavily on his tongue. Keith buries himself further into the battered Chesterfield, exiled from Sam Holt's office, hanging a booted foot over the edge of the armrest, watching as Pidge and Hunk take apart and fuss over his poor, battered baby.

Keith scrubs at his eyes with the back of his hands, exhaustion seeping into his bones. It feels like they've been here for days. Weeks, even. Time rushes by while simultaneously crawling at a glacial pace. Everything hurts, everything aches, everything -

"You're depressed."

Keith blinks, taken aback, and sits up straighter in his chair. The leather makes an embarrassing raspberry sound that would usually inspire playful ribbing from either Pidge or Hunk (or both), but they remain silent. It's unnerving

"It's just a car, Pidge," Keith says, eyeing Red's exposed innards. His own guts squirm uncomfortably in response.

"No, I mean you're actually depressed. You're the worst kind of people-pleaser because you pretend like you don't give a damn when you clearly do. You thrive on being told you're actually good at something, because you criticise yourself almost constantly. _All _of your self worth comes from other people, as much as you'd love to lie to yourself and pretend it doesn't. You're half an orphan, the product of wrong side of the tracks teenage parenting, all too familiar with the worst of the American foster care system, _and _one of your few sources of stability is marrying another man. You reek of unresolved trauma,"Pidge replies, ticking each point off with her fingers. She wipes her greasy hands on the thighs of her jumpsuit, sharing an unreadable look with Hunk before continuing. "You're barely holding it together lately and it is showing. You should go see a doctor. I can come with you, if you want me to."

Keith falters, heart rabbiting wildly in his chest. He should have known better, Pidge's observation skills are second to none, but he had hoped that he'd been at least somewhat subtle. His phone suddenly vibrates with a message from Griffin enquiring about the wedding, and whether or not they should wear complimentary suits. Keith scowls at the phone and repockets it without even bothering to leave Griffin on read. The conversation he's being forced to have is emotionally taxing enough, and he doesn't need the additional guilt that always accompanies Griffin's unrequited feelings heaped on top.

"It's fine, Pidge. I'm sad, it's situational. I'll get over it."

"Will you?" Pidge continues to pry, albeit gently. She looks at him with and almost miserable fondness, dangerously close to pity, and Keith hates it. He wants to shrink away from it, but pride forces him to save face. "I don't think you're going to be able to 'get over' this, I really don't. You're naive if you think this is just about Shiro. Lance isn't on the same self-destructive path, and we all know he's been hung up on Allura for as long as you've been hung up on _him_. Shiro is just the tip of an incredibly tragic iceberg. You've lived practically your whole life without any real stability, pretending to be okay when you're clearly not. You've put all your eggs in one basket, and now that's being taken from you too. There's a lot going on, and I'm worried that you're not coping with it very well, if at all. Have you even talked to anyone about this? To your mom?"

The rain continues on, heavier now, almost threatening in the way it lashes against the roof. Keith petulantly chews on the inside of his lip until he tastes blood. "She doesn't need to know. Really, I'm fine. I don't need a bunch of drugs numbing me."

"Come on, I know you're smarter than that. Don't act like a moron. It's not about numbing anything; it's better living through chemistry."

"God, I can't believe you actually just said that."

"Believe it, dumbass," Pidge's expression morphs into something pained and broken, and her eyes look a little glossy. She sniffs once, and adds. "I don't want to lose you, asshole. And right now I'm really scared that I'm going to lose you."

"She's right, you know," Hunk says, tone kind and sympathetic, and effortlessly warm. "About you needing help, not about you being a dumbass. You're actually very smart. I mean, sometimes you _can _be a dumbass, especially emotionally, but on the whole you're—"

"_Hunk. _Focus."

"Woah, my bad. What I'm trying to say is we're here for you. We love you. It's not all big pharma pills, you know? You have options like therapy and group counselling, if that's more your speed. There's nothing wrong with talking it out with a professional. Like, it's actually a pretty big step in the right direction. You've dealt with a lot of crap, and you keep acting like you're this unbreakable robot, y'know? But you're human and it's okay to not be okay. If you don't want to tell the others, that's cool, I get it. But if you need someone to, I dunno, sit in the waiting room with a big box of your favourite freshly made baked goods, I'm your dude."

Keith swallows thickly, valiantly ignoring the way his eyes burn, and the globus sensation in his throat. "Thanks guys."

"And if you want a tiny gremlin who thinks you should double modulate a gendocam, which would make her totally _wrong _because singly modulating it is fine_, _by the way, Pidge is your girl."

**.: XXIII :.**

Shiro's bachelor party sneaks up on everyone.

They assemble like they're defending the universe; all serious expressions and vaguely colour co-ordinated outfits. It's a mission that requires their entire force; Matt having torn himself away from work and his new girlfriend (a woman Pidge has never met but insists must be fictional or some sort of advanced sex robot, if they're willing to date her brother), Allura and Pidge breaking away from the archaic 'boys-only' tradition.

"So, a Cuban, a Korean, and a Japanese man walk into a bar," Lance starts as soon as they get through the club's doors, spawning a collective groan from the rest of the group.

"I know that for some reason you all tolerate, even tentatively enjoy his company, but is Lance's presence really necessary?" Lotor grouches, shoving his hands into the pockets of his undoubtedly overpriced designer pants. They're almost as tight as Keith's are, and he momentarily appreciates the pert curve of Lotor's ass. Allura catches him looking and shoots him a wry grin that Keith can't help but reciprocate. "More importantly, is he going to be doing this all night?"

"Sadly, he's practically family now. I think Sam would have lectured me about proper social etiquette had I not invited him," Shiro says, laughing when Lance clutches his heart theatrically. "I'm not sure I'm okay with being grounded at twenty-six. It feels wrong, yet still scary. So Lance stays."

"Dude, I thought you had a robotic arm, not a robotic heart. I'm _hurt_."

"Then can you go be hurt somewhere else?" Lotor grouches. "Really, I'm sure someone, somewhere, will appreciate your theatrics, but if I have to hear another terrible pun, or poorly put together joke lacking imagination and a worthwhile punchline, I might actually commit a very serious crime tonight."

"You're just jealous because I have skills and you don't."

"The only skill you have is turning me off my food."

"S'better than turning you on."

Truthfully, Keith's grateful for Lance's poor attempt at a joke, because if nothing else it's distracting. Aside from a slight spike in the dull heartache, white noise that's not exactly tolerable, but that he's learned to live with, Keith feels uncomfortable, and painfully overdressed. Allura had insisted on braiding his hair for the occasion (though she'd failed to mention that she'd also be weaving red ribbons into his hair), the jeans he's wearing are so tight they're practically painted on, and while he's wearing an oversized leather jacket, the skin tight, cropped black and red tee he's wearing underneath leaves him feeling over exposed.

Not to mention, Shiro's looking good. Far too good.

Shiro is casually devastating, hair artfully mussed, dressed head to toe in black; a shirt that clings to pectorals and stretches nicely over his broad shoulders; combat boots that accentuate and add height to his already six-foot-four frame; jeans that hug all the right places, without being too clingy.

It inspires a carnality in Keith that is frankly frightening, and he has to remind himself that they're here for him best friend's bachelor party.

The club is steeped in sensuality, but lacking the seedy vibe that he had envisioned for a bachelor party hotspot. To Keith's admittedly limited knowledge, there are no strippers ready to spring out a moment's notice, and there aren't any scantily dressed men writhing on poles for their amusement. It's decidedly tame, at least by the standards tv shows and movies set, but it's still a hotbed for potential debauchery, if the over-spilling tray of drinks -at least two or three times as many shots as there are people - that Matt orders is anything to go by.

"Aren't we supposed to do a toast or something? I get that bachelor and bachelorette parties are products of heteronormative bullshit, so we should probably try and stay away from any conventions that inspire misogyny or miserable straight people stereotypes, _but _getting absolutely wasted seems pretty universal. So, toasts? " Pidge asks, scanning the selection with exaggerated interest. She viciously slaps out at Matt's hand when it wanders too close to a lime green concoction she has her eye on.

"Guys, you really don't have to," Shiro says, awkwardly scrubbing his hand across the back of his neck. It's an uncomfortable gesture that's painfully endearing, and a reminder that Shiro isn't the infallible, ever-confident god he's sometimes built up to be. He's still a butchered orphan, torn between two cultures. "I don't want to make a big deal out of it."

"Oh my God, Shiro, _stop _being such a goody-two-shoes. Isn't this supposed to be your last official night of freedom? We're getting hammered, and we're getting hammered in your name."

There's no arguing with Pidge, so everyone takes a drink from the rainbow assortment on offer and waits.

"Alright then, let's get this started," Hunk says, settling on a shot that resembles nuclear waste infused Mountain Dew. "Mr and Mr Shirogane? Weston? Shirogane-Weston? Help me out here Shiro, I feel like I'm brute forcing a safe combination."

"We, uh, haven't worked that out yet," Shiro replies sheepishly, thumbing his own shot glass. Keith purses his lips at the revelation – the wedding is a week away, after all – but decides against asking the burning question of _why_. It's not his place, and with Shiro acting so strangely lately, he doesn't want to strain their friendship further. "Could we maybe talk about something else?"

"Cold feet, Shiro?" Lotor asks in a way Keith _hopes _is light and playful.

Shiro splutters unceremoniously, tips of his ears turning a little pink. "No. Of course not. It's just weddings are overwhelming and stressful, and I came here to enjoy myself, not have another panic attack because on of the RSVP's has suddenly turned vegan and the caterer can't accommodate, or someone wants to bring a guest."

"Then to regular old Shiro!" Hunk raises a glass and chugs its neon yellow contents with a grimace. Keith raises his own burgundy coloured shot to his lips in response, trying hard not to wince at the sweetness that could instantly rot teeth. Shiro catches the disgusted scrunch of his nose, and chuckles. "Oh my god, is this battery acid mixed with food colouring? Am I going to die?"

"I'm far too old for this," Allura grimaces, slamming her empty shot glass on the table. Keith considers bringing up the fact that she is indeed the oldest member of the group, but he once saw her body slam an adult man at a particularly rowdy college party, and he's a little scared of her impossible strength. "Give me another."

"That's my girl!" Lance hollers with an exaggerated whoop. There's a possessive edge to the word 'my' that Keith certainly doesn't miss, and Lotor's responding glare could melt flesh from bone. Lance clicks his fingers in the centre of the table, demanding an audience. "All of you need to get on this level. I want to get so drunk I forget my own name. We're going to play drinking games, we're going to dance, and, if you're all lucky enough, I'm going to give Shiro a sloppy lap dance. I know we're on opposite ends of the Kinsey scale, but who am I to deny you?"

"Nobody wants to see you naked," Keith groans. There are several mumbles of agreement, with Matt and Lotor championing the movement. Allura giggles, elegantly wiping a mirthful tear away, while Pidge says something about her poor, virgin eyes being unable to handle such a spectacle, and drowns her would-be sorrows with another shot.

"I wouldn't mind," Hunk offers, before hastily correcting himself when all heads turn to face him. "Not as a sexual thing, I love you man, but I don't _love _you, you know. I just wanna see you make an ass out of yourself. Maybe film it, dig it out around the holidays when we're old and grey – no offence Shiro – for prosperity purposes. One of us has kids and we can mentally scar them for life like, 'do you wanna see uncle Lance drunkenly attempt to seduce uncle Shiro?'"

"Please don't be offended," Matt starts, looking somewhat traumatised. "But I really hope none of you have kids. There's only so much therapy can undo."

Laughter erupts freely among the group again, and for the first time in a long time Keith feels light. Keith allows himself to loosen up, diving headfirst into conversation, playfully ribbing his friends, and taste testing the various spirits, gathered like a shrine to alcoholism. Shiro commits himself to getting drunk, and Keith, ever at Shiro's side, follows suit. Lotor eventually takes the intuitive and orders a slew of cocktails with lewd names that inspire Shiro to groan and cover his face, and when some upbeat pop song that Keith has never heard of starts blaring, half of the group abandons the table to go dance instead.

The odd stranger drops by, either to talk to Lotor or Matt (the only other two to hang back and refuse to dance. Strangely, though Keith would have never thought it possible, they seem to be getting along well enough, if the way they're enthusiastically talking is anything to go by), even making polite small talk with Keith. It's not _unpleasant_, and with every additional drink Keith feels his muscles loosening and inhibitions falling away. A couple of times he even finds himself tentatively indulging in these brief conversations with strangers, though, no matter how good he feels, his eyes always stray back to the dance floor.

Shiro is ethereal, laughing and smiling under lighting that shouldn't be flattering, but somehow manages to accentuate all of his best features. Now and again he catches Keith staring, and Shiro flashes him a toothy, brilliant grin – more than likely an open invitation to join him on the dancefloor - and Keith looks away until his pulse settles and his skin cools, but not even the Gods themselves can stop him for long.

They're mid-way through a drunken debate on ethics when it happens.

Keith's distracted when his phone vibrates loudly, drawing all eyes the its place on the table. The name 'Griffin' flashes obnoxiously across the screen, along with a notification signalling an incoming photo message. Keith feels his face heat on reflex, and he scrambles to turn his phone over so it's facedown before the photo makes it through. It could be one of two things: a class schedule he wants clearing up, or a nude, and Keith sure as hell doesn't want the others potentially catching a glimpse at the latter. Keith returns his attentions to the table, and, finds Shiro, having returned from a brief spell on the dancefloor, nursing a drink and watching him intently, eyes occasionally straying to Keith's phone.

"Everything okay, Keith?" Shiro asks carefully. He plants his palm on the table to steady himself, and very deliberately brushes his fingers against Keith's phone, eyes sharp and focused. Expectant, Keith realises. "Is someone _bothering _you?"

"No," Keith says, and he's thankful for the ambient lighting, obscuring his blush. He can't tell what, if anything, Shiro's seen, and the uncertainty pools low in his gut. "I'm fine, it's just one of those carrier surveys. Nothing important."

Somewhere behind them, a song change is punctuated with an enthusiastic "_hell yeah!" _from Pidge.

"Nothing important," Shiro parrots, sounding a little distant. Shiro gulps down whatever is in his glass almost obscenely, and Keith watches the bob of Shiro's adam's apple with fascination. When it's empty, Shiro pounds the empty glass against the table with enough force Keith is surprised it doesn't crack on impact. Shiro's lip pulls up in a lopsided grin, and he leans into Keith's space. He smells like liquor and aftershave, but it's not totally unpleasant. "Good, I don't want to share you tonight."

As though Shiro uttered a failsafe designed to keep Keith well-behaved and easy to control, Keith's mind whites out, and with a sharp inhale the room is plunged into silence. The nightclub melts away, the music comes to an abrupt halt, and people blink out one by one, until it's just him and Shiro. Keith sucks in a shaking breath, urging his blood to circulate normally and _not _rush immediately towards his crotch. Almost as though he's aware of the affect he's having, Shiro has the gall the laugh.

Eventually, after an endless epoch in the void (or, perhaps, a handful of seconds), Keith returns to the real world in a rush; sounds, smells, and sensations violently crashing into him all at once. Shiro is still waiting expectantly, as though anticipating a response from Keith, but his brain isn't quite ready to formulate words.

Keith is, however, functional enough to feel Matt stare at them with a raised brow, and he's certain that Lotor is hiding a devilish smirk behind the rim of his martini glass.

"Do I have your attention, Keith?" Shiro presses. Matt says his name in warning, but it goes unheeded. "It's my last chance to do this."

Keith is breathless, shaking, perhaps a little _too _drunk, when he whispers, "yes."

**.: XXIV :.**

The graduation-turned-engagement-party is a bust, and Keith finds himself lingering on the outskirts, hanging close to the makeshift bar that was once their kitchen. People constantly flit in and out to refresh their drinks, or catch their breath enough to avoid spewing their guts up in front of their friends or love interests. Keith greets them all like some wise and weary barkeep, shooting them a two-finger salute from just below the bottom of his backwards snapback when the particularly inebriate him thank him with a "you're the best, dude" or "thanks, bro, you saved me life". Luckily, no one from their friend group has pressured him for more than a top up or snarky remark, though Allura had warned him to slow down when he'd grabbed a bottle of $5 champagne by the neck and chugged.

Which, given Keith's current mental state, was a fair request.

While he'd initially been excited about the party when it was just about Shiro and Matt obtaining their degrees, celebrating Shiro pledging his life to someone else is about as appealing as an hour-long sternum rub.

Keith, objectively, wants Shiro to be happy, and logic had reasoned that, four years into their relationship, marrying Adam was the logical next step. But the reality is far more painful than Keith had ever anticipated, and jealousy - ugly, vicious - writhes in his gut.

Keith's about to press his lips to the mouth of the bottle when a tall, dark figure approaches, at first making a show of scanning through the various liquors, spirits, ales, and canned cocktails. He eventually reaches for a Jack Daniels bottle and fills his solo cup, but his focus remains squarely on Keith. It's a little unnerving, and Keith finds himself self-consciously shifting in his seat so he's sitting up a little straighter.

"You're Keith," the stranger says bluntly, though the way he pops his hip and encroaches on Keith's physical space suggest he's, at the very least, interested in Keith to some degree. "You'd come to our frat parties from time to time. I'm Ulaz, I'm a friend of Shiro's."

Oh, right.

Keith tries to remember Ulaz but comes up short. Shiro had so many frat brothers, all nameless and faceless in Keith's memory, and Keith was always the habitual outsider at parties, even after he'd loosened up and started attending them on the regular. He latched on to one of his friends and kept his orbit tight.

"Congratulations on the graduation," Keith says, a southern twang that only resurfaces when he's sufficiently drunk peaking out. He feels momentarily self-conscious, both of his accent and of the fact that he's unable to attach any sort of memory to the face in front of him.

Ulaz sees through the empty statement, lip twitching. "I'm not surprised or offended by you not remembering me. Shiro seemed to dominate your time and attention."

"He is guilty of doing that sometimes," Keith hums in agreement. More than he'd like to admit. Keith's spent too many long and tortured nights with nothing but Shiro on the brain. But Ulaz doesn't need to know that. Instead, Keith says, "I'm surprised you remembered me."

"Why wouldn't I? You're quite striking," Ulaz replies easily, and though his tone is still flat and somewhat formal, _something _about it makes Keith's chest constrict in response. Ulaz is _definitely _flirting with him.

Keith stops to consider his options.

Ulaz isn't unattractive. He's tall and broad, all high cheekbones and a finely pointed chin. The bleached blond mohawk is carefully styled, and inspires the need for Keith to run his hands through it and mess it up in sheer defiance. His accent is pleasant enough, even if Keith can't quite place it, but that only adds to the allure. Keith could definitely do worse.

Keith sinks onto his elbows, and looks up at Ulaz through half-lidded eyes, feeling confident. Of course, it helps that he's more than a little buzzed. "Is that so?"

"Can I get you another drink?" Ulaz asks, one side of his mouth titling upwards. "We could find somewhere quieter. It's hard to have a real conversation down here."

The _down here _is so pointed, it may as well have been a giant, gilded arrow directing them straight towards Keith's bedroom. He doubts that its already in use; Keith's wild-card reputation carries enough weight, and if any other couples have snuck off for some privacy, then they'll likely have crashed in Hunk or Lance's rooms. The desperate need for distraction and the desire for sexual gratification merge together and pool low in Keith's abdomen. He rises to his feet, a good head and then-some shorter than Ulaz, and presses their bodies as close together as he possibly can without actually touching. "I'm not really much of a talker."

"Neither am I."

Ulaz places his solo cup down on the already crowded kitchen table, and Keith's about to drag him upstairs and forget the rest of his shitty day when he hears it.

"Is everything okay in here?"

Keith and Ulaz leap apart, and the expression on Shiro's face treads the line between disappointed and repulsed. Something about that look, combined with Shiro's tightly set shoulders, and the way his arms are crossed in front of his chest, make Keith feel as though he's being reprimanded, but rather than shrink back, he decides to push his luck. Keith leans back into Ulaz, and while the other man tenses, and doesn't reciprocate his advances the way he had before, he certainly doesn't push Keith away. "Everything is perfect, you don't have to worry about us."

"Congratulations on your engagement," Ulaz says, refusing to give anything away in his voice.

"I think Thace is looking for you," Shiro says, looking past Keith and almost coldly regarding his (now former) frat brother. Keith narrows his eyes, struggling to decipher whatever _this _is, but he's spent so long living as an outsider, and his social skills aren't quite up to scratch. He's emotionally stunted, this much isn't new, but the issue is exacerbated by the alcohol in his system. Maybe there was some unspoken rule in their fraternity about fucking each other's friends, or maybe Shiro's pissed that they're derailing his celebrations with Adam.

Ulaz and Shiro stare at one another for several seconds, before Ulaz eventually relents and pulls away from Keith. He dips his head and whispers, "maybe next time," into Keith's ear, but strides out of the kitchen nonetheless.

Leaving Shiro and Keith alone.

"What are you doing?" Keith hisses as soon as the door swings shut. "Aren't you supposed to be my wingman or something?"

Shiro's stony expression softens, and he uncrosses his arms to raise his palms in an act of surrender. "Keith, you're drunk. I don't want you doing something you're going to regret the moment you sober up."

Keith snorts, but he can feel his resolve falter. It's hard to be mad at Shiro, harder still to stay mad when Shiro is always driven by the best intentions. Even so, Shiro's just cost him his one chance at _forgetting _for the night. "Look, I appreciate the sentiment, but I'm not some blushing virgin, you don't have to protect my honour. I promise you I've done much worse, while a lot soberer than I am now. I could have had _fun _tonight. Do you know how long it's been since I _had fun_?"

Shiro's cheeks heat, and Keith finds himself scowling again, unable to puzzle out the situation. He's starting to think he has drunk more than he thought, and maybe he should have followed Allura's advice. Still, Keith has never been one to tread a cautious path when the self-annihilation is a much more gratifying option.

"You can do better."

"You sound jealous," Keith jokes half-heartedly, too drunk to properly shield himself from his own wishful thinking. Keith removes his snapback to card his hand through his hair, expect Shiro to roll his eyes and make some sort of comment about safe sex, or drinking responsibly, or a demand that Keith take him seriously.

Instead, Shiro recoils, visibly flustered.

There is, of course, a significant chance that Shiro deems him so unfuckable, that the mere thought of Keith hooking up with anyone repulses him. Given the disappointingly platonic way Shiro seems to have categorised their friendship, the latter seems much more likely. He's spent the last few years being extensively prepped on Shiro's lack of interest, and Keith knows that there's an unspoken expectation among their friends. A combination of being unapproachable and standoffish, and totally, pathetically, hung up on Shiro likely results in Keith's well-preserved virginity. Shiro might be (blissfully) unaware of Keith's hopeless crush, but Shiro has to know what Keith was like – what he's still like, outside of his inner circle.

Despite himself, despite logic and sound reasoning, and the fiancé undoubtedly awkwardly socialising with Shiro's friends in the other room, a little thrill worms its way down Keith's spine. He wants to imagine that Shiro's concern is actually desperation wrapped up in a neat little disguise. Keith wants Shiro to pine for him, to want him, to love him. It's a selfish desire, egged on by alcohol that turns Keith's stomach inside out.

Egged on by Shiro's laboured breathing, and his pink cheeks.

Keith's acutely aware that he smells like stale booze and sweat, there's a hole in his t-shirt just to the left of his navel, and the jeans he'd changed into after the ceremony haven't been washed in weeks. Still, he takes a tentative step forward, and allows himself to hope. "Shiro?"

"I'm not jealous, Keith," Shiro says finally, firmly, recoiling away from Keith. His brand-new engagement ring catches in the light, punctuating the point. Shiro almost sounds angry, _disgusted _even.

The rejection is winding, and Keith struggles to not to cough in response. It shouldn't hurt, not really. He's knows Shiro is with Adam, hell, they've just gotten engaged, _today_, and yet Keith had still held out just a little, drunken hope. Seeing things that clearly aren't there.

"I have to go," Shiro says sharply, turning on his heel and heading towards the door. "I'm sorry for ruining your night. If I see Ulaz, I'll send him your way."

With that, he disappears beyond the door door.

"Fuck! Shiro, wait!" Keith cries. He's drunk, and desperate, and oh so confused, and the person he cares most about in the whole world seems angry at him for reasons Keith can't quite parse out. "I'm sorry."

**.: XXV :.**

Somehow, against all the odds, the group convinces Keith to dance.

He feels awkward and stupid at first, and Keith is hyperaware of all the strangers in the club who might be looking at him, or judging him, but eventually he's overwhelmed by his friends' contagious laughter, and the liquor dulling his senses, and he just allows himself to feel.

The words "wedding" and "marriage" are suspiciously absent, unanimously vetoed,

Shiro is vibrant. A terrible dancer, but between visits to the bar and rounds of shots, he moves like his only purpose in life is to have fun. The mood is contagious, Keith finds himself throwing his head back and laughing. He feels freer and happier than he has in a long, time, and all the festering anxieties that Pidge had been worrying about seem to evaporate away. Allura makes him twirl her around, her skirt artfully flaring with her, while Pidge tries (in vain) to teach Keith how to floss.

Eventually, after considerable number of drinks, Keith finds himself dancing one on one with Shiro. At first it's silly, mimicking each other, light and playful faux-waltzes, dipping, spinning. But as the night bleeds on, as the number of drinks stack up, their touches become more deliberate, almost sensual. Shiro's hand lingers on Keith's throat, or pulls Keith in close by the hip.

Shiro's dancing improves, hand skimming the entire length of Keith's torso, bodies flush together – Keith's judgement is impaired, but if this is just an elaborate fantasy, egged on by years of pining and far too much to drink, Keith's willing to go with it, just this once.

"K-keith." Shiro rolls his hips as his breathes out a shuddering, wet breath, and Keith grinds against Shiro in retaliation. It's practically a living wet dream, although intoxication makes it fuzzy at the edges. Keith smirks to himself, lets his body do its own thing and writhe to the music's tempo, while his brain fixates on the sensation of Shiro touching him.

The illusion shatters when Matt slots himself between them, ushering Shiro away, so Keith breaks away from the group to take a leak.

The sterile, lavender hued bathroom lights are a little sobering, and as Keith is washing his hands, he can't help but take a moment to appreciate the way his hair is damp against his face and neck, and the deep red flush staining his throat and face. His breathing is laboured, and he sways a bit as he stands, and all in all he looks _wrecked. _Keith still can't tell if his grinding session with Shiro was actually real, or a trick of the imagination, somehow, but every time he tries to focus on the issue, he hits a mental brick wall.

To his surprise, Shiro accosts him in the narrow hallway that separates the main area from the bathrooms.

"Hey," Keith squeaks in surprise, stumbling back. He fumbles his footing, and finds himself partially collapsed against the wall in an attempt at keeping himself upright.

"I need to talk to you." Shiro says, words a little slurred, but face pinched and angry. Keith tries to puzzle out _why _Shiro might be so annoyed but falls short.

"What's wrong?"

"You're bringing _Griffin _as a date to the wedding?" Keith watches as Shiro's tongue scrapes across his front teeth. He looks agitated in a way Keith's never seen from him before. He plants his hand on the wall next to Keith's face, either to impose or steady himself, it's hard to tell. His breath is sweet from the mixers and cocktails they've been chugging like beer as it fans across Keith's face. "I thought you hated him."

"How did you—"

"—The RSVP's come to my place, Keith. Answer the question."

Keith pops his jaw at the accusatory tone, a surge of sullen defiance washing over him and heightened by liquor and a lack of sleep. "Yes. I'm bringing James to _your _wedding."

"So it's 'James' now?

"I don't know, _Takashi_, is it?"

Shiro falters briefly, eyes widening in surprise, before curling the fingers besides Keith's head into a fist. "Are you fucking him?"

"It's complicated," Keith pouts, and a combination of the intrusive nature of the question, and the smooth way the profanity rolls from Shiro's tongue makes his pulse quicken, and his neck feel warm and itchy. Keith makes an attempt at covering his exposed, goose-bitten flesh by pulling down his shirt, but it ultimately fails. "We've grown up."

"So you're dating?"

"S'none of your business."

"You're either fucking him or you're not. It's not rocket science."

"We have a mutually beneficial friendship."

Shiro's frown deepens. "He's an asshole. Do you remember what he did to you? How badly he hurt you?"

"Maybe I _like _that he's hurt me," Keith hisses, offering up his entrails in confession. "Maybe it makes me feel _good_."

The frenetic music at the nightclub pulses on, punctuating the silence that sits between them. It punches the air from Keith's lungs in a harsh rhythm, constricts his throat until he's left twisting and gasping for air.

"So, what do you like?" Shiro's voice dips into a sultry baritone with a sharp, almost jealous, bite to it, and Keith has to battle full body shiver that it drags out of him. It's so unlike Shiro, but for a split-second Keith is eighteen again; smoking on a wraparound deck with fingers – metal and flesh – digging into his hips. Except this Shiro isn't a shy and stuttering frat boy who can't handle his smoke. This Shiro is a dark and sultry clone, with predatory eyes that almost seem to glow _'danger'_. Keith must have slipped and hit his head in the bathroom, because he's pretty sure that this Shiro is _flirting_with him. Dreaming or lingering in the fuzzy between world separating life and death are the only explanations. "Are they all like _James_? Do you like them cocky and pretty and pathetically eager?"

"I like them _big_," Keith says pointedly before his brain can veto it. Too much alcohol has made him sloppy and, as it stands, the filter between Keith's brain and mouth has malfunctioned. Shiro's breath hitches, and Keith's worried that he's taken the game too far. But then the expression of shock morphs into a smirk that Keith can only describe as hungry.

"I'm big," Shiro brags, taking liberties and further invading Keith's space. The implication is less of a subtle innuendo, and more like a freight train with 'FUCK ME' painted on the side in big, bold letters. It's Keith's turn to suck in a sharp breath, and Shiro visibly delights in the effect he's having on him.

"Shiro," Keith croaks. He's dangerously close to doing something stupid, like taking advantage of Shiro's inebriated state and dragging him back towards the restrooms. The scenario plays out in his head; Keith leans up and whispers _'show me' _against Shiro's ear, before blowing him in the bathroom stall. In his head Shiro fists his hair, fucks enthusiastically into Keith's mouth, biting back moans and whimpers of Keith's name. In his head Shiro calls him a good boy and, after he blows his load down Keith's throat, returns the favour by pressing Keith's face against dirty tiles and fingering him open. Keith's had too much to drink, but he's fairly certain that _this _Shiro would willingly fulfil his fantasies, leaving him half hard and pining. But Keith also knows that a sober Shiro – the _real _Shiro - would regret it, and one of them has to exercise self-control. "You're drunk."

"I am," Shiro agrees. He presses his body against Keith's, grinding up once, and Keith should be shocked by the insistent press of a budding erection against his abdomen, but it feels strangely inevitable. This Shiro is sex-starved and has been dripping with want from the moment he cornered Keith. It's as emotionally gutting as it is arousing. "So are you."

"You're _engaged_."

The mood sours, and Shiro's face crumples. "You don't have to remind me," Shiro snaps, though he seems more agitated than offended. Keith wishes he had the mental clarity to process what that might mean, but he's too lovesick and there's nothing to soak up the alcohol in his system. "Your accent. It's cute."

"Shiro," Keith starts, but he's cut off with a hiss when the other man rolls his hips again. It's emotional anarchy. It's half a decade of longing. It's white-hot desire. It's the desperate need to let go and indulge. It's pain and pleasure.

It's interrupted when Lance rounds the corner.

"Is everything alright, guys?" Lance asks, pointedly looking between Shiro and Keith. Shiro has the decency to look guilty, leaning back and shifting his weight to his heels. Keith's stomach knots, a wave of nausea exacerbated by inequity, and he's only able to nod pathetically in response.

"Keith and I were just talking," Shiro says, lacking in his former confidence.

"Uhuh," Lance replies, eyes trained on Keith's face. It makes him want to squirm, but he has a feeling that any attempt to move will result in him projectile vomiting right there and then. "Shiro, I think Matt is looking for you. It sounded important, so maybe you should go." Coldly, he adds. "Like, now, dude."

"Right, yeah." Shiro doesn't look at Keith as he staggers off towards the main area of the club. In fact, he keeps his head hung low, like a scolded schoolboy. When he disappears into the crowd, just another body in the sea of colours that's growing increasingly fuzzy, Keith lets out a long, ragged breath.

"Oh, buddy. What are we gonna do with you? You feeling sick?" Lance asks, planting a palm on the small of Keith's back when he nods pathetically, guiding him back towards the restrooms. "I don't know why you do this to yourself. You're both dumbasses intent on committing emotional suicide, and I don't get it. The pining shit? I understand, I've been there. But you've made it this big-ass thing, and it's destroying you."

"M'gonna throw up," Keith mumbles in response. Somehow Lance successfully navigates them back to the toilets, kicking open a stall, and less-than-gracefully lowering Keith to his knees. The floor is questionably moist, but Keith doesn't care. He's hot, and bothered, and his body is punishing him for whatever just transpired. Keith squeezes his eyes shut, forcing something hot and wet to roll down his cheeks. "He's getting married and I don't know how to be a person. I just really love him. S'not fair."

"I know, dude. I know," A hand pets his head affectionately, and Keith retches with a wet splat that suggests he's turned the cubicle into a warzone.

Lance and Hunk take turns holding his hair while Keith spends the rest of the night spilling the contents of his stomach into the bowl of the toilet.

**.: XXVI :.**

Keith's nursing one hell of a hangover, and he contemplates turning to the dark arts so he can summon a demon to put him out of his misery. His tongue feels thick and furry in his mouth, and his throat is raw and briny, but it's the incessant throb behind his eyes that really gets to him.

He considers the fact that he might be getting too old for drinking, and groans.

Lance and Pidge had been the ones to get him settled in his apartment, dragging him from the club and to a taxi, and from the taxi to his place. Keith vaguely recalls clinging to Lance's back like a spider-monkey, while Pidge kept her hands and his ass to stop him from falling off, but his memory of getting home is spotty at best.

They'd both slept the night, _"to stop you from doing something stupid and self-destructive like aspirating vomit," _as Pidge had put it, but no-one addressed the black-and-white haired elephant in the room the next morning. Instead, Lance had complained about waking up to Kosmo standing over him ("_your weird fucking wolf wants to eat me, dude!")_, while Pidge bemoaned the lack of Oreo flavoured Poptarts in his rather grim pantry.

It's a blessing when they finally leave his apartment, allowing Keith to wallow in peace.

As per usual, the universe has other ideas.

The knock at the door startles Keith off of the sofa and onto the floor, far louder than it has any right to be. It takes him longer than it should to push himself back to his feet, using the coffee table as leverage while he curls his toes into the rug. The knocking comes again, forcing a low, unhappy rumble in Keith's throat, and he manages to stagger to the door without further incident. Even if the way he all-but rips it off of its hinges is a little extreme.

"Hi, Keith," Shiro says, scratching the back of his head sheepishly. Keith blinks in surprise, the string of expletives he'd planned on hurling the intruder's way dying in the back of his mouth. "Can I come in?"

"Uh, yeah. Okay?"

Shiro steps in and awkwardly settles himself on the armrest of the chair, eyes trailing Keith as he shuts the door and tentatively follows. Keith leans back against the countertop, arms crossed in front of his chest, and, thankfully, Shiro takes the initiative and chooses to speak before Keith has to invite him to do so.

"Last night was a mistake," Shiro starts. "It's not an excuse, and I should never have spoken to you like that, but I was drunk last night. I wasn't thinking clearly. I wasn't thinking about what you wanted. And I'm so, so sorry."

"Okay. Apology accepted," Keith replies, careful to maintain a level of detachment. While most of his memories from the night before are hazy, he remembers his rendezvous with Shiro with perfect, nauseating clarity. "Back at you. I'm sorry for what I said too. We both had way too much to drink. We all say and do things we don't mean."

"That's the thing. It's why I wanted… why I _needed _to come here and talk to you, actually," Shiro starts, stopping to chew nervously at his lip. He wrings his hands once, twice, and then a third time before speaking again. "I shouldn't have said it… like _that, _and I definitely shouldn't have tried to take advantage of you by propositioning you like I did, but I truly meant what I said last night. I don't want you to bring Griffin to the wedding."

"Yeah, well I don't want you to marry Adam. I guess we're both shit out of luck," Keith blurts out bitterly, unable to stop himself before it's too late. Panic sweeps through him, he can feel his eyes widen, and his knees buckle, and the pounding headache certainly doesn't help. "Shit. Shit, shit, shit. Shiro, that's not what, I meant. I—"

"Stop," Shiro's eyes scrutinize Keith's intently, trying to search for an answer. He fights the urge to look away and break the gaze, after all, it's Keith's only way of being truly honest. He knows Shiro wants to try and pull the answer from him, and if Keith can try and tell him through some odd psychic connection instead of uttering the words to life, then maybe the rejection won't hurt as much. Slowly, oh so slowly, Shiro rises to his feet and steps forwards until they're stood chest-to-chest."Keith."

His name ghosts across his own lips as Shiro exhales, and it's all the time he's allotted to prepare himself, because Shiro is bridging the gap between their mouths.

The kiss is everything Keith has ever imagined, and so much more. Shiro's lips are chapped, but somehow still soft. It's innocent enough, at first, but then Shiro slides his hand into Keith's hair and tugs at the roots, and Keith can't help but moan in response. Shiro uses this as an opportunity to lick into Keith's mouth with a boldness Keith hadn't anticipated. He reciprocates needily, all hot tongue and puffed out whines of pleasure, but when one of Shiro's hands snake under his shirt, tears spring to his eyes and Keith pulls back, just enough to break the kiss.

"Why are you doing this to me, Shiro?" Keith's voice cracks pitifully on the 'Shiro', throat wet and tight, clogged with emotions he's unable to continue to push down and repress. "You must have known how much I love you. Everyone else knows, and I've never had to say a word. I've been in love with you for years."

It's not a hill that Keith is particularly willing to die on.

"I-I didn't know, I didn't think," Shiro whispers against Keith's lips. "Everyone?"

"Fuck. Yes, Shiro. Everyone. God, even Lance figured it out by the end of our freshman year."

"I'm an idiot," Shiro sighs. His hand is still resting on the back of Keith's head, and he gently kneads his fingers. "I love you too."

The confession should be something beautiful. Profoundly life-changing in the way that fiction tells him it should be, in the way that he'd always imagined hearing those words would be, but it's not. It's flaying, miserable, and strives to compound every moment of hurt and grief he's gone through into four little words. Keith's aware that he's shaking, but he feels outside of his body, as though he's a spectator.

"Why are you telling me this now?" he finally croaks out, willing his poor, abused body to obey him as he brushes past Shiro and stands at the other end of the room, desperate to put some distance between them. "You're getting _married, _Shiro. Why are you doing this to me at all?"

Shiro's face falls, and he looks simultaneously younger and older than Keith has ever seen him. There's an undeniable innocence in the quiver of his lip, boyish, and sweet, that's at odds with the way his body sags. Exhausted, tired. Overly abused. Shiro reaches out a hand to close the newfound distance, palm open, and when he speaks it's little more than a plea. "It's you, Keith. It's always been you."

"Don't do that. Don't act like we're on an even playing field. Don't act like you've been in love with me for just as long, because we both know that's bullshit," Keith snaps, hot, angry tears spilling from the corner of his eyes. "You don't have to act like this is anything more than cold feet. You don't get to come here, and tell me this, and make me think that you actually want me – that you've_wanted _me – because you have Adam. You're marrying Adam."

"That's not fair!" Shiro cries, recoiling as though physically struck. He paces a little, burying his head in his hands as he does so, and Keith kind of wishes he'd stop, because it's doing nothing for his hangover. Eventually, Shiro stills, though he makes no effort to expose his face, and mumbles something that Keith doesn't quite catch.

"What did you say?"

"You called me your brother!" Shiro practically screams, tearing his hands away and glaring at Keith from across the room. The accusation is gutting, almost as wounding as the confession, and it catches Keith off guard. Shiro's brows knit together, his face flushed, and jaw tensing, and for his own sanity Keith tries not to acknowledge the wet sheen of his eyes.

"W-what?"

Shiro charges towards Keith, caging him against the wall. The tears are impossible to ignore now; falling freely down Shiro's face, dripping from his chin. He's shaking too, his metal arm unnervingly still while the rest of him quite literally quivers with emotion. "I was _so close _to leaving him for you, and when I tried you called me your brother. Do you know how long I've wanted you, how many nights I wrestled with being in love with you while still in a relationship with Adam? I spent so long thinking up ways to gently let him down and leave him, and when I _finally_worked up the courage, you told me you saw me as a brother!"

"No. You don't get to do this, Shiro. I was willing to love you in any way I could. I still am. My poor communication skills are still secondary to you having a long-term boyfriend."

"I was scared! I've lost everything, Keith. My parents, my grandparents, my dignity, my arm. All I had left was you and Adam. I was scared that if I said something, I'd lose both of you. I could handle saying goodbye to him, but you? Not you. Which is why, when you said I was your brother, I couldn't… I couldn't ruin things, I couldn't lose you, by pushing for more. I was a coward."

The confession slices Keith open, a scorching, white hot blade that cauterises as it slams through flesh. With little else to do, with no other way to defend himself, Keith surges up and kisses Shiro again, and Shiro responds without coaxing. It's hotter and wetter that their first kiss, and Keith has the breath knocked out of him with Shiro slams them both against the wall.

The enthusiasm is intoxicating.

"I love you," Shiro gasps between kisses, hands worming down the length of Keith's body until they reach his ass, squeezing once before hoisting Keith up and encouraging him to wrap his legs around Shiro's waist. "I love you, I love you, I love you."

"I love you too," Keith pants in return, one hand fisted in Shiro's hair, the other roaming Shiro's shoulders, his neck, his arm – anywhere within reach. "I love you so fucking much."

"Can I touch you?" Keith is enamoured, and doomed, and pathetically helpless.

"Just don't stop."

**.: XXVII :. [edited][explicit content redacted]**

It's dirty and oh so wrong.

They should be using a condom.

Personal biases aside, Adam deserves so much better than what they're subjecting him to.

It's nasty, and reckless, and so not him, not _them_.

Guilt churns in the pit of Keith's stomach, and when he sobers up emotionally he knows he's going to hate himself for hurting a man whose only crime is also loving Shiro.

It nags at the back of his mind, persistent in its message that this is not how Keith wanted their first time to go. That no one was supposed to get hurt. Logic reasons that sex, especially first times with someone new, is never quite the mood lit fanfare fiction makes it out to be. Teeth bump, noises squelch, and sometimes orgasms only really result in a blown load, rather than a blown mind. Keith clings to logic, but the nagging continues.

Keith wanted something saccharine; wanted their first time to be as a couple. Wanted it to be the natural progression after dates, a string of heated kisses, and mounting need. Wanted to be able to curl up against Shiro's chest after clean-up, and know that this is something that could stretch on for eternity.

Keith _still _wants that.

Most of all, he never wanted anyone to get hurt.

"Are you ready for me, baby?" Shiro asks, almost irritatingly self-assured.

_Always. _

He's been ready for Shiro since the moment they met, perhaps even before then. Whatever they were made of, whatever star or planet that had burnt too brightly, too chaotically, they belonged to it together. Fragments just waiting to come together again, to find one another again, across millions of years, millions of miles, millions of realities.

_As many times as it takes._

"Shh, I know," Shiro says, petting at Keith's sweaty hair, and Keith is aware that he's babbling. He doesn't know how much of it Shiro heard, how much of it he understood, but Keith knows Shiro understands him on a primal level. Shiro inspires a sort of love, an unavoidable fragility, in him that can't be expressed through language, but he hopes his body can fill in the blanks. "I'm going to start moving now, okay?"

**.: XXVIII :. [edited] [explicit content redacted]**

Shiro takes him, slowly, with his mouth the second time.

Shiro removes his prosthetic, tossing it onto the chair next to the bed and rolling his shoulder to fight off any stiffness, the gesture unexpectedly intimate. The scar where the stump meets healthy flesh is ugly and gnarled, but Keith still considers it beautiful. It's a 'fuck you' to the Powers That Be; a story of survival, of overcoming fate, and Keith keeps one hand on Shiro's shoulder, thumbs digging into patchwork skin, and the other tangled in Shiro's hair.

It doesn't last, though it never does. Reality quickly breaks through the sex induced fog, harsh and unrelenting.

Shiro and Keith can never be together.

They simply exist on the same plains of different realities, fated to cross – over and over and over again - but never quite blend. Keith is self-aware enough to know that allowing himself to indulge in this fantasy won't solve wither of their problems, and he isn't equipped to save himself, much less both of them. Loving Shiro for all of these years never prepared him for the practicalities of a real relationship. Shiro deserved stability. It was something Keith could earnestly promise, every intention of fulfilling, but words and good intentions can't sustain a relationship, nor can they supplement twenty years of trauma.

Life is war. Life is suffering. Life is perfect moments encased in misery. Life is stewing anger and abandonment issues. Life is falling in love with your best friend. Life is losing it all.

Eventually, one of them will fly too close to the sun, and collapse over the edge of the universe when their melted wings give way.

Keith can't risk that person being Shiro. Shiro deserves so much better.

"We should run away together," Shiro says quietly, pushing himself upright. His body is scorching hot against Keith's, surprisingly soft and pliant given his muscle mass. He mouths gently at Keith's neck. "I want to be with you. I can't marry Adam. I won't. I won't do it."

Keith can't bring himself to look at Shiro when he says, "you have to."

"What? Kei-?"

Forcing a wilted half-smile, Keith averts his eyes. His heart fractures in his chest, and the blood rapidly begins to pool. At this rate he might actually drown in it. "I'm the best man. It's my job to talk the groom out of his cold feet, isn't it?"

"Why are you doing this?" Shiro sounds wounded, and Keith can feel Shiro's fingers as they curl around his shoulder in an attempt at encouraging eye contact. Keith's resolve is unfaltering, and he pushes back against the contact. "I love you, Keith. You love me."

"Addicts love cocaine, that doesn't make it good for them. You can't be the centre of my emotional universe, Shiro, and I can't be yours. It's not healthy. It's obsessive, and it's going to burn us out, and I _can't _lose you, Shiro. I just can't."

"Why couldn't I have met you first?"

"It wouldn't have made a difference."

Keith is little more than a hastily written side note, scribbled messily into the margins of Shiro's life, not quite able to make it to the final draft. Whether or not Shiro and Keith had met before Shiro and Adam is completely irrelevant. They're vessels for something simultaneously bigger and smaller than Keith can comprehend, but they're taking different paths.

"Keith, _please, _I –"

"Stop," Keith croaks out, willing his body and voice to hold out just a little longer. His insides are smouldering wreckage, and he might actually die. "Please, just go. Adam will be waiting for you."

Keith can hear Shiro's hushed crying as he reattaches the prosthetic and gets dressed. Keith waits until the door clicks shut before he lets his own tears fall.

**.: XXVIII :. **

It's Shiro's last official day as an undergraduate, so they're crowded together on Krolia's tiny porch swing, beers wedged between their legs in quiet celebration. It's unreasonably hot, even for this time of year, and Keith has to keep palming at the beads of sweat gathering at his forehead, trickling down the curve of his throat. Logically, he wouldn't be so hot if he gave himself a little space, but ever the masochist, he simply can't bring himself to part ways from Shiro. He enjoys their easy, practiced intimacy, the magnetised way their bodies fall together.

"I'm scared to graduate," Shiro confesses, his brows knitting together. The confession takes Keith by surprise – after all, he's never known Shiro to be scared of _anything _– and he instinctively twines their fingers together in a display of comradery.

"Why?" Keith asks gently.

"Things change. People change. College is its own world, and everything is so different as soon as you step outside of the bubble. The person you were in love with can turn into a stranger, and -" Shiro draws in a deep breath, and scrubs his free hand across his face. "God, Keith. I don't want that to be us. I can't lose _you."_

Overcome with emotion, Keith snatches both of Shiro's hands in his own. The beer bottles clatter to the floor in the process, and while none of them actually break, they do create messy puddles that will grow stale by the morning. It doesn't matter, nothing else matters in the entire expanse of everything. It's just him and Shiro, and it almost feels as though it's always been him and Shiro. Keith squeezes Shiro's hands, desperate to fight off the loneliness and insecurity, and remind Shiro of his blind devotion. "I promise you, I will _never _leave you"

**.: XXIX :. **

_"– No one knows me like you do, and since you're the only one that matters tell me, who do I run to?" _

Adele's 'All I Ask' has been on repeat for the last 36 minutes, and while Keith wants to gnash his teeth at the living cliché he has become, in the moment the lyrics feel like the most profound shit to have ever been birthed on this godforsaken mudball planet. He hates Spotify for allowing him to emotionally self-mutilate like this, but he hates himself for every decision leading up to this moment much more.

Keith's eyes are red rimmed, gritty and burning from having cried so hard, and his nose is stuffy with snot. He hasn't slept a wink; his sheets reek of sex and Shiro, and he can't stomach falling asleep and having to deal with the consequences of his actions all over again once he wakes up. Because Keith likes to suffer, the wedding invitation is propped up on the coffee table. Taunting him.

_"– I know there is no tomorrow, all I ask is if this is my last night with you, hold me like I'm more than just a friend –"_

"Fuck off!" Keith yells, frustrated. Whether he's screaming at Adele in particular or just the world is unclear, even to Keith. It rouses Kosmo from his nap, and he sleepily trots over to Keith and noses gently again Keith's thigh with a low whine. Keith buries his fingers in the thick mane of fur at Kosmo's neck.

_" – It matters how this ends, 'cause what if I never find love again?"_

It's a pathetic picture that he's painting - enmeshed in guilt, an active participant of adultery, his first meaningful friendship in tatters - and Keith can't help but feel as though this father would be deeply ashamed of him. That thought lances through Keith, eviscerating him all over again, and he heaves out another sob as Kosmo butts his head against his lap.

Pidge was right.

Keith is a semi-functional human being at best, and a full-blown calamity at worst. He's burning wreckage on the side of the road, fodder for rubberneckers and a tragic headline that will be forgotten by the next twenty-four-hour news cycle. Pining for Shiro never solved anything. Sleeping with Shiro didn't solve anything. And pushing Shiro back into Adam's arms as a form of self-sacrifice certainly won't solve anything.

He's still the kid with the dead father and the missing mother. He's still the foster child no one wanted. He's still the surly teenager that classmates actively avoided. He's still scared that his mother and not-quite step-father will have their own family, and he won't be needed anymore. He's still in love with his best friend. He's still painfully lonely.

Keith is broken, but desperate enough to want to change.

He gropes for his phone, ignoring the dozens of unanswered texts and missed calls under Shiro's name, and hits _call_.

Predictably, he picks up on the fifth ring.

"Whatsup man?" Lance asks, voice a little grainy and slurred with exhaustion.

"I fucked up," Keith cries, pausing to press the heel of his palm to the corner of his mouth to quell the emotion. It doesn't work, and he hiccups his way through another sob. His nerves plucked raw, and the elusive façade shatters. Still, there's an unspoken comradery between them, shared experiences of love and loss, that allows Keith to share this vulnerability with Lance without judgement. "I can't do this anymore. I can't. I fucked up and I told him, and we slept together, and it's all a fucking mess. He's marrying Adam, and I've ruined our friendship, and I feel like everything is going wrong. I'm so fucking _tired_, and I don't know what to do."

"Oh, Keith," Lance's voice is gentle, compassionate.

"I've destroyed everything."

There's a long pause on the other end of the line, and then Lance lets out a small breath. "Look. I'm long overdue some vacation time, and my mom has been trying to get me to come home for a visit for, like, forever. Quit your job and come with me, it's not like you planned on babysitting military brats for the rest of your life anyway, right? I'm sure your mom and Kolivan won't mind taking care of your wolf-thing, and if my boss complains I'll just tell him where to shove it, 'cause it's a shitty job anyway."

"Lance, I…"

"Don't get all soppy on me, man. We both have reputations to uphold. So, pack your shit, call your mom, and I'll see if I can swing us a cheap flight out for tomorrow."

"Tomorrow? But what about—"

"Weddings aren't really my thing. Too many emotions, and as the handsome, suave one, I spend most of the day running away from flirty bridesmaids," Lance interjects, forcing joviality. Softer, he adds, "I'm sure he'll understand, Keith. Maybe not right away, but he will. He does love you, that's totally obvious to anyone with eyes. But you can't worry about him right now, and he can't worry about you. You're both fighting for the biggest fuck up award, which is _really _saying something, considering prince Daddy Issues is also in the running."

Keith eyes the invitation, crumpled and dog eared and abused as it is. It's weighted with a finality that Keith is ill-equipped to deal with. The confirmation that it's not going to work out. That it was _never _going to work out. He's been through too much, he's too broken, too jaded, to have expected that falling in love with his best friend would end in anything other than heartache, but that doesn't stop him from hurting. But wallowing and prolonging his suffering instead of getting help won't fix things.

"I'll pack a bag," Keith says before abruptly hanging up.

Still stewing in guilt, Keith opens his messages, types a desperate and sincere "_I'm sorry_", and hits send.

* * *

**SHIRO**

**.: I :.**

If gently pressed, or feeling particularly honest and vulnerable, Takashi 'Shiro' Shirogane will guiltily admit that he fell in love Keith Kogane with the day that he marched into Dean Iverson's office and passionately argued against Keith's possible expulsion. He'd launched into a thirty-minute presentation on why Keith breaking another student's nose wasn't his fault; how James Griffin had more than deserved what he'd got, and had even threatened to drop out, should Keith lose his scholarship.

Keith had watched him with open mouthed wonder, as though Shiro had defied the gods themselves on his behalf. And Shiro? Well, Shiro had recognised that his threat was sincere, that a life without Keith, someone who had gone through so much heartache and deserved something _good, _seemed truly unbearable, and not just pretty words designed to scare Iverson.

However, that is a lie.

If Shiro is being truly honest, he fell in love with Keith the moment he realised, as they sat sloppily swapping stories and smoke on a frat house's wraparound porch, that Keith saw _him_. Not the orphan. Not the cancer survivor. Not the amputee, or the campus record setter, or the unofficial foster son, or the frat brother capable of a 43 second keg stand. But simply Shiro. That being 'Shiro' was enough.

Love at first sight, a fan of romantic tropes and cheesy romcoms might say.

Luckily, Shiro has always been a big fan of clichés.

**.: II :.**

Shiro breaks up with Adam the day before the wedding.

It's been a long time coming.

Being with Adam had been easy. They'd met, they'd forged a friendship, and then that friendship had, slowly and without pomp and circumstance, evolved into something new. While wanting Adam hadn't been an immediate thought or desire, Shiro has never really had to _try _in their relationship either.

Their love was lukewarm, but that was okay. After a lifetime of disease, and loss, and fighting, lukewarm was nice. Lukewarm was safe. Lukewarm was undemanding. Lukewarm was stable. Lukewarm stretched out and promised far more than volatility ever could.

It was good, before it wasn't.

Shiro had tried to rationalise it at first; meeting Keith was cataclysmic, the birth of a brand-new universe. He'd heard rumours of some prickly, upstart freshman smashing his way through all the academic records Shiro had set, but _nothing _had come close to the real thing. Keith was a spitfire, wild and untameable, and Shiro had been dangerously willing to throw away everything he'd careful cultivated with Adam for a drunken, almost-kiss fuelled by raging hormones and an overwhelming burst of attraction so powerful, it demanded acquiescence.

Suddenly lukewarm had begun to feel like a cage, and Keith's confession had been a necessary, if poorly timed, Get Out Of Jail Free card.

It wasn't that Shiro doesn't or did not love Adam. But that while Shiro loves Adam (a slow, gentle love that follows the same tempo as his love for Matt, or Sam, or anyone else in his found family), he is, unquestionably, in love with Keith, a corrosive infatuation that had altered his entire being.

The problem had, in Shiro's retrospective naivety, been the fact that he had (up until a few days ago, at least) believed Keith didn't love him back. Well, that was unfair. Shiro knew, and had always known, that Keith loved him, he'd said it enough – maybe not always explicitly, but in the small "drive safes" and "I miss yous." Shiro had simply operated under the belief that this love was strictly platonic. Shiro had thought that he'd made his interests clear; he'd all but laid his heart of for Keith, a careful confession, when he'd tried to broach the subject of breaking up with Adam.

Knowing what he knows now catapults him into the unknown. He's a scared teenager that's woken up from a coma missing a parent and his arm.

Breaking up with Adam simultaneously feels like the easiest and hardest thing he's ever going to do.

Shiro lingers in the hallway of their apartment complex for a good ten minutes, rehearsing the conversation in his head, and summoning the courage to actually go inside. Shiro anticipates shouting and tears and arguments that stretch on well into the early hours of the morning. He anticipates a nuclear explosion, a collapsing star.

Instead Adam seems almost… relieved, even when Shiro guilty tells him about his rendezvous with Keith. There's hurt there, and Shiro hates himself for what he's done, but Adam deals with it with a surprising degree of composure. Adam takes his glasses off and puts them to the side, before letting out a long sigh and scrubbing his hand through his hair.

"Okay," Adam says with a deep exhale. His hands are shaking slightly, but his shoulders are set with a kind of resigned determination that makes Shiro's heart stutter with admiration. "We're going to lose a lot of money, but it's still cheaper than a divorce."

Eight years die with a thin hiss. It's unexpectedly anticlimactic.

Shiro blinks, sure he's misheard him. "Adam, I _cheated _on you, and you're worried about our finances?"

"I'm not going to forgive or excuse your behaviour. It was cruel and wrong. But it's not entirely unsurprising. We'd have both been miserable, Takashi," Adam says, thumbing his bare ring finger. "We already were miserable. We want different things out of life."

The need to placate is overwhelming, and Shiro finds himself replying defensively on impulse. "We weren't… our goals weren't…"

"You're in love with him," Adam says simply, cutting Shiro off. It's not a question, it's not even an accusation. It's soft and tired, and tinged with regret, but it's also accepting, as though he's known for a while. Shiro's heart plummets at the realisation, the urge to reach out and comfort Adam overwhelming. But he knows it won't do either of them any good, so knots his hands together instead.

"I am. I'm in love with Keith," It's a hyper-simplification, but it's not dishonest. There's no way he can reasonably articulate what he feels for Keith. He's spent six years trying to churn it over into something slightly more palatable than _'I fell in love with a broken boy, alone on a porch, who introduced me to shotgun kissing, even though I was already in a committed relationship._' "Adam, I'm sorry."

Adam suddenly rises to his feet, though he keeps his gaze trained carefully on the coffee table. "I'm going to call my mother and pack a bag. I'll stay with my parents for a while, at least until the end of what would have been our honeymoon. We can discuss living arrangements and other necessities then. We should start letting people know that the wedding is cancelled, though I won't force you to go into the specifics. That won't be productive or helpful to either of us."

Shiro's throat is charred and he struggles to wet his mouth enough to conjure up a response. "Okay."

"Be careful with him, Takashi," Adam says, eyes narrowing. There's something almost parental about the tone of his voice, pre-emptively scolding. "He's fragile. He'd give you the world if it meant seeing you smile, and if he'd willingly pledge his life to yours, even if it cost him his own, without any sort of hesitation. He and I are very different beasts. You cannot promise Keith an eternity and not go through with it. If you don't intend on loving him for the rest of your life, let him go."

"Adam, I would never… I could never walk away from Keith. He's…". apologetic "He's everything to me. I would give, I would _do, _anything for him."

Adam, sad, first real glimpse of fragility, as though the last whisper of hope has been extinguished. "I know."

Without Adam, the apartment feels cold and clinical, like the barren waiting rooms that swallowed up his teenage years, as though it has never really belonged to Shiro in the first place. Shiro looks around at their shared possessions, meagre as they are, and feels absolutely nothing. The absence of his presence is nothing compared to the twist in his own gut whenever he thinks about a life without Keith. It's not Shiro's home, it's Adam's, and staying here now when its true owner has abandoned it to spend the night in his mother's spare room feels wrong.

Maybe, one day, some years into the future, he and Keith can get a place of their own.

Shiro pulls out his phone and tries not to let the dozen unanswered texts that he's fired Keith's way bother him. His confession was poorly timed, and Keith's never been good at _feelings_. Still, he can't help the small swell of hope, of excitement that arches through his veins when he thinks about the future they could share now that they're both free.

"Please call me back when you get this," Shiro begs into the receiver the seventh time he his call goes straight to answerphone. There's a certain sense of fear that flays flesh from bone, and Shiro can feel himself plucking at his own, exposed nervous system. "I love you."

**.: III :.**

"I'm in love with Keith."

Shiro watches Matt's face carefully for some kind of reaction, but, to Shiro's dismay, Matt handles the revelation in his stride and simply takes a sip of coffee. "I know."

"You know? Did you hear what I just said?"

"Of course I did," Matt replies, wiping his forehead with the sleeve of his overalls, consequentially smearing a fat, brown stain across his skin. "It's a fact of life. Water tastes better out of a bottle, most of the things you learn in algebra class will serve no purpose beyond high-school, the sun is hot, and you're in love with Keith."

"How long have you known?" Shiro asks, incredulous. His heart has started to speed up in his chest, a twisting, suffocating anxiety worming its way through his body. It tastes a little like guilt; coppery and dense, cloying, impossible to swallow down.

Matt shrugs, exchanging his coffee cup for a set of tools that look more like torture devices than anything else. "I mean, I'd _like _to say sometime in our junior year, but back then I thought it was just a crush. I realised it was more than that before graduation, though."

The revelation stuns Shiro. "Why didn't you _say _anything?"

"I didn't want to complicate things further by adding my two cents. I figured you had your reasons. Keith obviously felt the same way about you, but you chose Adam. I assumed you either loved Adam more, or you were waiting out the natural life cycle of your relationship because you suck at all aspects of romance, including break-ups. Although waiting until the day before you wedding to make a decision is cutting things a little _too _fine."

"Keith and I slept together," Shiro confesses guiltily. The need to purge himself is overwhelming. Perhaps it's because he's spent the last week actively avoiding anyone who asks _why _the wedding was called off. Perhaps it's because he still hasn't heard from Keith (though Lance's mystery, last minute vacation certainly explains _some _things), or perhaps it's just because Shiro needs a friend. "The day after my bachelor party."

"Shiro," Matt groans, visibly disappointed. "I knew this would happen. Dammit, I _knew _this would happen. I _saw _how you guys were acting at your party, and I was trying to stop you from making any rash drunken mistakes, but apparently you were hellbent on hitting the self-destruct button, so you made a sober one instead."

Shiro winces, but makes no attempt to protest the well-deserved scrutiny. Even before they'd fallen into bed, Shiro's behaviour at his bachelor party had been inexcusable. At the time, it had been a culmination of fears, his final chance to change his fate. The wedding had run away from him, and the desire for stability and control had made Shiro desperate and selfish.

"I take it Adam knows," Matt says, watching Shiro carefully.

"Yeah, I told him."

"How'd he take it?"

"…Better than I thought he would?"

"And Keith?" Matt asks, raising an eyebrow until it disappears beneath the scruffy hair handing over his face.

"He's…" Shiro sucks in a shuddering breath. Knowing that Keith is gone, and verbally admitting that fact are two entirely different things. Saying the words aloud feels like a form of acceptance, and up until now Shiro's been trying to kid himself that Keith is still here. "He left me."

**.: IV :. **

Lance comes home after three weeks. Keith doesn't come home for five months.

Shiro calls to check in with Krolia as often as he can without seeming like an obsessed ex-lover, which, he supposes, he _technically _is. It's a compulsive need that he can't tamp down, no matter how hard he tries.

Though they eventually start to soften, at first, Krolia and Kolivan both regard him with thinly veiled hostility, and Shiro can hear the _we finally had him, and you drove our son away again _behind every "he's not here."

"I didn't mean to… I didn't _want _this," Shiro tries, his throat thick. There's so much more he wants to say, but he can't formulate the words. "I care about Keith. So, so much."

Krolia's resolve falters just slightly, her lips parting and her fingers flicking upward before she catches herself, as though she wants to comfort Shiro. There's an unhappy pull to her eyebrows, and she stands like that for a moment before heaving out a sigh. "You should go home, Shiro," Krolia says, far gentler than he deserves. "I _can't _tell you where Keith is."

"Please," Shiro begs, sinking to his knees and threading his fingers through his hair. Everything is slipping through his fingers, and it's all too much. The control and composure he's spent so long attempting to master is slipping, and all of his fears are crashing down around him. History is repeating itself all, Shiro is losing everything precious to him. He knows that creeping sense of ennui and despair well, and it's a struggle not to succumb to it. It's everything he feared would happen, everything he _knew _would happen.

Shiro's nightmares have always been hyper-focused screeching tires and crumpling metal, the sharp tang of petrol and burning rubber; desperate screams for his mother, his father, for anyone, to save him, to take away the pain ripping through his forearm. Now they're drawn to a close with the image of Keith, hands fisted in the bedsheet, furiously demanding that he leave, before disappearing in a plume of purple smoke. Shiro's shoulders are shaking, and it's hard to breathe, but he manages to gasp out, "I just need to know he's okay. That he's coming home."

"He is safe," Kolivan says gruffly from behind his partner's shoulder. "At this moment, Keith desperately wants to see you. But his choice to leave was his alone, and you must let him come back to you in his own time. He's chosen to confront his greatest hopes and fears. It seems you must do the same."

Desperation drags Shiro to the dingy bar near Keith's workplace.

It's dark, littered with knickknacks and newspaper clippings that are yellowed and curling at the edges. If the uniforms are anything to go by, the patrons seem to be almost entirely made up of the same military academy, though only a few of them wear badges connecting them to Keith's particular space programme. Shiro feels painfully out of place, and he can feel several pairs of eyes tracking him, lingering on the metal arm. Judging him.

Shiro is on the verge of giving up when he catches a glimpse of them out of the corner of his eye; four vaguely familiar faces crammed into a booth, laughing jovially. Despite it being the entire purpose of his visit, walking over and actually introducing himself is a lot harder than he thought it would be. It's not that feels shy, he's just terrified of confronting an unseen victim of his actions head on. More than that, Shiro is scared of uncovering something, some truth, that might widen the physical and emotional gulf between him and Keith. Sucking in a deep breath, Shiro pushes through the fear an approaches them.

"Hello," Shiro says a little sheepishly, resisting the urge to break face and scratch the back of his neck. "I'm not sure if you remember me, I'm a friend of Keith's. We all went to Garrison University together. My name is Takashi Shiroga—"

"I know who you are, _Shiro,_" Griffin snorts, defensively crossing his arms over his chest. His companions bristle with newfound hostility at the sound of his name. In particular, a tall, dark skinned man with sharp olive eyes and shoulders almost as broad as Shiro's own, fixes him with a menacing look that feels as though it could flay skin from bone.

Shiro awkwardly clears his throat and shuffles his weight between his feet. "Right. Of course."

"Is there a reason you're here?" Griffin asks, making only the most basic attempt to feign civility. "My friends and I are trying to enjoy ourselves, and my ex-something's ex-something is making that a little difficult."

"I know I'm probably the last person you want to see right now, but I need to know if you've spoken to Keith lately. He's gone and I…" Shiro clamps his jaws and grinds his teeth to prevent himself from getting overly emotional. "I'm worried."

"No," Griffin says firmly. "He text me to say he was sorry. All of my follow up texts and calls went unanswered, and I haven't heard from him since. When I went into work the following Monday, I was told he'd resigned with immediate effect. So, no, Keith and I aren't exactly on speaking terms right now. Though I'm glad he let me know how he feels now, and not right before our wedding."

"Ouch, point proven," Shiro winces, taking several steps back. His dignity suitably in tatters, he goes to retreat, hands raised in apologetic defeat. "I'm sorry for bothering you."

"Shiro," Griffin says, voice still firm, but lacking the biting edge. "You don't need to rush this. You've waited this long. He'll come back to you eventually."

When it comes to relinquishing information, Lance isn't much better.

Shiro accosts him after work, waiting for Lance at his pickup, a bribe-come-apology hot chocolate in hand. "Where is he?"

"Okay, I know we've got this weird little family vibe going on, and, like, boundaries don't really exist anymore, but this is kinda creepy."

Ordinarily, Shiro would agree with him. But, ordinarily, Shiro wouldn't be doing this. He knows it's unhealthy, that it's madness, but it's been five weeks since he's seen Keith's face, since he heard his voice, and it's _killing _him. Keith's absence itches not unlike a phantom limb, and it's only now that he's gone Shiro's able to understand just how crucial his presence way to maintaining his general equilibrium. The loss is agonising, maddening, and he needs to fill the void in his chest – Sam can't fix this with fiberglass and metal. "I know, and I'm sorry to keep doing this, but I miss him, I miss him so much. I can't live with this uncertainty. I have to tell him that I'm sorry."

Lance theatrically drags a hand over his face, a slow, deep groan accompanying the gesture. "Shiro, you know I love you man, but I also love Keith. He needs more time."

Desperation rears its ugly head again, and Shiro can feel his breath quicken without his consent. It all feels too much, the scar across the bridge of his nose and his stump throb in tandem protest, and he has to swallow several times to repress the bile clawing its way up his throat. "Just tell me if he's okay. _Please? _You have to have spoken to him recently. Come on, Lance. Please."

"Keith's learning to be his own person. He's always been orphan Keith, or foster kid Keith, or _Shiro_'_s _Keith. He's working out how to just be Keith. He's got to unlearn, like, two whole decades of unhealthy coping mechanisms so he can function as a person again. He needs this. You both do."

The emotional maturity is startling, and for a moment a powerful sense of pride overwhelms the crushing uncertainty and loneliness. "Yeah, you're right. I'm sorry."

"Keith loves you," Lance adds with a small, supportive smile. "He loves you so much. He'll come home to you, I'm pretty sure even an apocalypse couldn't keep you guys apart. You both just need to heal."

**.: V :.**

Shiro is a sentimental drunk. It's something he's always been aware of, but right now it's like he has no control over his emotions. He feels as though he's standing (or, rather, wobbling) on a precipice, and his only options are to take a leap of faith into the unknown, or wait to be pushed.

The only thing grounding him is Keith.

They're crowded together on Krolia's tiny porch swing, beers wedged between their legs. It's far too hot, and Shiro's shirt is clinging to his back, soaked with sweat, but Keith's proximity is everything he needs right now, somehow capable of prickling Shiro's skin despite the oppressive humidity.

"I'm scared to graduate," Shiro confesses, his brows knitting together. It feels like a display of weakness, and it's something that he and Adam have argued about on more than one occasion. Adam can never seem to understand why settling down, establishing a hum-drum, _adult _routine scares him so much. Shiro knows Keith won't judge him, though. Keith never does. Shiro lets out a tiny gasp when Keith intertwines their fingers.

"Why?"

"Things change. People change. College is its own world, and everything is so different as soon as you step outside of the bubble. The person you were in love with can turn into a stranger, and -" Shiro takes a deep breath to steady himself, and scrubs his hand across his face. "God, Keith. I don't want that to be us. I can't lose _you."_

Shiro startles when Keith suddenly takes both of his hands, clasping them tightly in his own. The beer bottles clatter to the floor in the process, and while none of them actually break, they do create messy puddles that will grow stale by the morning. It doesn't matter, nothing else matters in the entire expanse of everything. It's just him and Keith, and it almost feels as though it's always been him and Keith. "I promise you, I will _never _leave you"

"How many times are you going to have to save me?" Shiro asks, embarrassingly soft.

"As many times as it takes," Keith's skin flushes, and he worries his lip between his teeth.

Feeling bold, Shiro drops Keith's hand and cups his cheek instead, swiping his thumb across high cheek bones. Keith's lips part, and Shiro's heart rabbits in his chest at the sight of it, hope – needy, pathetically needy hope – burning in the cavern of his chest.

"Keith, I think you're beautiful."

God, he wants to kiss Keith so badly, it's physically painful. There's a flash a guilt, a vague, fuzzy flash of Adam, but it pales in comparison to the want. He's going to hate himself later, but he's helpless. He's a terrible person, but he's also a fool in love.

Still cupping Keith's cheek, Shiro leans in, eyes fluttering closed and head tilting to one side.

A noise from within the house disturbs them, shattering the moment. Keith pulls back, and Shiro tries not to let the disappointment consume him. He should have known better, really. Apart from that first night, and even that may have been a figment of Shiro's imagination, Keith's not shown any interest in him beyond the parameters of the friendship.

"I should get going," Shiro croaks. "Tomorrow's going to be pretty stressful."

Before he can get up to leave, Keith's hand curls around his wrist, stilling him. He's looking at Shiro with impossibly wide eyes. Shiro's breath catches, entranced by the beautiful purple sky trapped in his irises. "If it wasn't for you, my life would have been a lot different. I owe you so much. I will never give up on you."

Shiro barely sleeps a wink that night.

**.: VI :. **

When it comes down to it, idealistic heroism is shit, and has a tendency to hurt those closest to you; a fantasy forced to fly with clipped wings. Self-sacrifice isn't just offering yourself up on a plate, but the raw, still beating, hearts of everyone who has ever loved you. While you might be entitled to a hero's burial, those around you are doomed to rot above ground, slowly and painstakingly.

Keith's father died a hero, but, to some degree of cowardice, left a grieving child alone under the scorching desert sun, to be picked at by vultures. Running into a burning building to save one child, while knowing you'll be orphaning another in the process, will always be a moral struggle between what is right for the many, versus the few. Ultimately deciding to spare an entire family the miserable burden of grief, and ultimately lay it all on the shoulders of a single, lonely eight-year-old, was both Tex Kogane's greatest accomplishment and his biggest sin.

Likewise, when Krolia, frightened and sixteen and with a gang breathing down her neck and a baby on her breast, had opted to abandon the love of her young life, and the infant they shared together, she'd done so as an act of heroism. Unwilling to drag them both into the seedy underbelly of the world she was forced to inhabit, she'd fled; gifting Keith with his first taste of loss and abandonment.

In their bravery, in their desire to do what is right, Tex and Krolia doomed not only themselves, but Keith with them.

And Shiro… Shiro the fucking Hero choosing to clutch his feelings close to his chest, smuggling away anything and everything he might have felt for Keith that breached the strict self-enforced rules he lived by, might have been an act of emotional bravery on his part, but it had still unwittingly left an already broken human desperate and dying in the dust.

Shiro can see that now, time and distance a cold wakeup call, and he understands Keith's need to duck out before his smouldering bones turn to ash.

"You're beating yourself up unnecessarily," Allura says one day over a teacup of peppermint green tea, her eyes soft and sympathetic. She's one of the few members of their group brave enough to single him out, and force Shiro to confront everything that festers inside. "Nothing you did was ever done with malicious intent, was it? You were oblivious to Keith's reciprocated feelings and kept yours at bay to save not just him, but Adam. You endeavoured to protect not just one heart, but two, and did what you thought to be best. That's all any of us can ever do, Shiro."

**.: VII :. **

When Shiro finally sees Keith again, it's entirely by chance.

It's winter, the first dustings of snow have started to settle on the streets, and the sky is a perpetual pearlescent blue. It's not thick enough to resemble the kitschy hallmark cards already lining the shelves, but it's just enough to make children stop and stare with wide-eyed wonder.

Shiro's never been overly fond of this time of year. The cold makes what's left of his right arm ache, and the holidays, no matter how warmly the Holts welcome him into his home, remind him of everything that he's lost. It's been hard, trying not think about the two new names added to that ever-expanding list.

Not thinking about Keith.

Truthfully, it's been difficult.

Shiro still drives out to the desert at night, hoping beyond hope to find the peace he once found there, fantasising that Keith is out there, somewhere, staring up at the same stars. He still finds himself instinctively reaching for his phone when he finds a new sushi bar or movie Keith might like. It's hard to squash a seven year habit.

It's not that Shiro isn't making the effort. He's tries, he really does. He settles into his new life, his new routine. He goes to therapy to discuss his fractured childhood, and his cancer, and his freshly aborted marriage. Shiro's new place is small, but nice and pet friendly (perfect for his newly adopted cat), in a quiet area of town, not too far from Coran's, and he hangs out with his friends whenever he can. It's awkward, of course it, and there's _the _taboo subject that no one brings up, no matter how much the empty space at the table bothers them all, but it's an approximation of normal. Hunk's been teaching him how to cook, at least the very basics, to make ensure Shiro doesn't poison himself or starve. Matt's landed him a job interview, a position that would actually let him utilise his degree and chase his dreams. He's stopped hassling Krolia and Kolivan for information, and he no longer sends essay length texts and emails that end up looping back to him with a standardised "_we're sorry, but this account is no longer in use" _messages.

Shiro is healing, but he's not fully healed. Not yet. Dismantling his former life has taken far longer than Shiro ever thought it would, and there are still unopened boxes piled at the foot of his bed in his new apartment. Some of those boxes are simply labelled "books" or "photographs", while others have "loss" and "grief" scrawled on the side in permanent marker. He'll get around to unpacking it all eventually.

Shiro lets out an exhale like dragon's breath, and ducks further into his jacket, wishing he'd worn a scarf so he could at least wrap up the bottom part of his face. He can _feel _his nose glowing bright red, and wriggles it in a vain attempt to warm it up. He knows he probably looks silly, but Shiro can't bring himself to care.

He's just about to head towards his car and press his fingers against the heating vents when he sees _him_.

As it habitually does, life thwarts his plans.

Keith's squinting at a store window – a _baby _store of all places – hands already overflowing with bags, hair in a messy bun perched on the top of his head. He taps the toe of his scuffed doc martens against the sidewalk as though contemplating a purchase, head tilted to one side and jaw clenched. It's frankly adorable, and Shiro's sure his mind must be playing tricks on him, and he blinks rapidly to try and shake the mirage, but no matter how tightly he screws his eyes shut, Keith remains ethereal and pretty and _here_.

"Oh, my god."

Keith's head snaps up at the sound of Shiro's voice, and spots him immediately. His eyes widen a fraction, lips opening and closing wordlessly. Shiro's lungs vacate and he welcomes the sensation, real and raw and beautifully human.

Without thinking Shiro sprints towards him gathering Keith in his arms, pressing his nose to the crown of Keith's head and inhaling. Keith stills momentarily, and Shiro worries that it's too much far too soon. He starts to loosen his hold, forming an apology in his head, but then there's a clatter of bags hitting the sidewalk, and Keith's clutching Shiro just as tightly, his fingers scrambling for purchase in Shiro's coat.

"Keith, I…" Shiro chokes out, throat clogged and voice cracking. Keith's hair is soft and pleasantly fragranced against his nose, and he can feel the hot, shuddering gasp Keith makes against his neck. "I can't believe you're really here. You're here. You're actually here and you're _real_."

Keith pushes away and Shiro reluctantly lets him go. His skin is flushed prettily, and he looks around awkwardly as he picks up his scattered bags. Shiro feels his nose scrunch in confusion when he notes just how many of the bags seem to be baby or child related in some way, but he can't bring himself to ask. Keith, ever the perceptive and sharp, follows Shiro's gaze.

"My mom's pregnant," Keith blurts out. "I… I wasn't ignoring you. My mom, she's having another baby. With Kolivan, obviously. It's why I'm here. I mean, I was always going to come back, it's just why I _am _back but I haven't called you yet. She's considered high-risk, you know? Geriatric. Which is actually kinda funny when you consider the fact that she was an MTV stereotype when she had me. I've been looking after her, and I was planning on reaching out to you when I knew she was safe, but… shit, I'm rambling."

"Yeah, you are," Shiro says fondly. He's enacting emotional anarchy, and probably undoing the progress he's made over the last few months, as well as committing several dating taboos, but that's okay. "Do you wanna go grab a coffee, maybe? We could …talk."

Keith's responding smile is blinding.

"I would love to."

**.: VIII :.**

The coffee shop Keith suggests is nice. Quiet and rustic, but lacking the usual hordes of hipsters and disenfranchised youth. Shiro shakes the entire time he's ordering their drinks, but when he glances back at the table, Keith looks completely at ease and happy. It suits him.

"So, congratulations are in order," Shiro says weakly, picking at his cookie and dunking a chunk of it into his black tea. "I can't believe Krolia is pregnant."

"It is surreal," Keith admits with a laugh. He sips at his seasonal hot chocolate, using his tongue to catch the excess cream clinging to the corners of his lips. Shiro tracks the movement, trying not to choke on his sodden cookie. "I was scared at first. It's stupid, but it felt like my mom was going to forget me once the baby was born. Once she had a _real _family. But I'm not scared anymore. I'm actually really excited."

"How long have you been back?" Shiro asks, a pathetic attempt at acting casual. Keith sees through him and smirks, amusement evident in his violet eyes.

"A week, maybe? Though it feels like so much longer, I've been so busy. I've been running errands for mom and looking for a place to live. Kolivan keeps offering me the down-payment on some ritzy place uptown, but I don't want him to feel like he has to buy me off just because he accidentally impregnated my mother."

Shiro nearly chokes on his tea and has to slap a hand over his mouth and nose to ensure liquid doesn't start exploding from various orifices. "You really think it was an accident?"

"Ew, Shiro, no! God, that's gross. Please don't go there. I can't decide what's worse, my mom and sort-of stepdad accidentally creating a child, or actively planning the nasty so they could bring little baby Yorak into the world."

"Yorak?"

"That's what mom wants to name the baby if it's a boy. She likes Dorma If it's a girl, which is… marginally better."

"Keith, you cannot let her name the baby Yorak."

"I've been working on Kolivan to get her to change her mind."

An entertained silence settles between them, but Shiro can't let it fester for long. It still feels a bit too much, a bit too surreal, and he doesn't want to surrender to the nothingness in case this really is an illusion, and Keith will disappear again unless supplied with an endless stream of conversation.

"I have a cat now," Shiro says a little awkwardly, cringing at himself. "I rescued her from a shelter. Her name's Black. My therapist suggested it, actually. The, uh, adoption part, not the name. Apparently companion pets are useful tools for PTSD sufferers. Though she's less service animal, and more tiny, opinionated beast who demands fresh tuna every Sunday."

"Welcome to parenthood." Keith snorts affectionately, and the sound makes Shiro's insides fizz. His violet eyes twinkle, and he pulls out his phone to show Shiro a photo of Kosmo proudly sat with a whole cheeseburger between his jaws, tail an unfocused blur behind him. "I'm still trying to teach Kosmo 'no'. As you can see, it's going _really _well."

Shiro chuckles, shaking his head. "Owning animals is a lie humans came up with to feel better about themselves and their position on the food chain. Animals are absolutely the ones in charge. Black demands I go to bed at 11pm every night. If I don't, she stands on my shoulder and meows directly into my ear."

"Single parenthood is rough."

"So, what have you been up to?" Shiro asks, urging the conversation along. "You know, apart from training to be a doula and wrangling fast food away from Kosmo."

"I've been helping kids like me," Keith says, concealing a pleased smile behind his palm. The pride is new, and Shiro decides he likes the way it looks on Keith. "There are factions of the Blades all over the country, and lots of kids who need guidance and a safe place to just be. And, don't take this the wrong way, but it felt good growing without you. I had to find out who I was. I've been meeting with a grief counsellor. After my dad died, I ticked boxes. I was whatever and whoever I needed to be to survive. I don't have to do that anymore."

"I'm proud of you, Keith." And he really is. He's always known that Keith was destined for greatness.

Keith smiles at the praise, but he doesn't respond to it. Instead he purposefully places his cup in his saucer and asks, "What happened to Adam?"

The question catches Shiro off-guard, and his self-preservation demands that he shift the focus of the conversation away to more pleasant topics. Opening up is terrifying, and Shiro's anxiety rears its ugly head again. Still, it's a necessary exchange, and, ultimately, Shiro's desire for resolution – for _honesty _– with Keith wins out.

"He was definitely nicer than he should have been when I told him, but he seems happy now. You were gone, and Matt was worried. He tried setting me up with this guy he works with, Curtis," Shiro stops to laugh, but it's a product of anxiety rather than any genuine amusement. He's never been overly vulnerable to the opinions of others, it's not conductive to getting things done, and as a gay, Japanese man short one limb, paying too much attention to public scrutiny could be emotionally devastating. But he's desperate to please Keith now. He knows that, as churlish and closed off as Keith can be, as he _used _to be, he'd never intentionally hurt Shiro. Even so, Shiro's heart thumps pathetically in his chest, and his palms are becoming slick with sweat. "He was nice, but it was so obvious I wasn't ready to move on. Would you believe me if I told you that him and Adam are actually dating?"

"Move on?" Keith asks, electing to ignore the rest of Shiro's rambling. The unspoken second half of the question lingers between them - _move on from me, or Adam? – _and Shiro's chest aches on reflex.

Shiro exhales through his noses, peaking up at Keith through his lashes. "Do I really have to say it, Keith?"

"Allura and Lotor broke up," Keith says in place of an actual answer. Shiro already knows this, of course, but he can't bring himself to say so and cut Keith off when it's the first time they've been together in months. God, he's missed Keith's husky voice, and the painfully cute way his bangs obscure his eyes. "It was amicable, right?"

"As far as I can tell," Shiro replies, desperately trying to sound neutral.

"He hasn't said it, but I think Lotor is dating a childhood friend of his, Ven'tar. He's mentioned her a few times recently. He seems … quietly hopeful. A lot calmer than he used to be. I don't think love has to be grandiose gestures, sometimes the best romances are the ones that just _are, _y'know?"

"Lance is probably secretly thrilled," Shiro says weakly. Shiro had always known that Keith kept in regular contact with Lance and Pidge following his disappearance, but it stings more than it probably should to know that Keith still talked to Lotor yet ignored him, especially given the amount of history that he and Keith shared. Maybe it's _because _of the history Keith felt unable to reach out to him. "He's hated Lotor for years."

"He doesn't hateLotor," Keith says, looking sheepish. "He may not be Lotor's biggest fan, but he never stood in the way of Allura and him being together, did he? Not like..._ well_. There's six or seven years of history there, Shiro. Give him some credit, Lance is a good person, and he cares about Lotor in his own, Lance way. He doesn't want Lotor to be unhappy."

"I'm sorry, you're right," The double meaning is unavoidable, and Shiro has to swallow several times to wet his suddenly parched throat. "How about you? Are you dating anyone?"

Keith shoots Shiro a dry, unamused look that's answer enough, and a tiny shoot of hope lays its roots in Shiro's heart.

"I am sorry about the way it happened." Shiro says instead. It's a scripted apology written on the receipt of their friendship, but it's not insincere. He has to be brave, to lay his feelings out and hope for some sort of resolution. He can kid himself that he's looking for closure, rather than a rewrite, but his $90 an hour therapist would probably disagree. "I loved you, Keith. I still love you."

"I love you too," Keith replies, voice straining like buckling wood underfoot. They bridge they're crossing is rusting and termite infested, but it somehow still supports their weight, if only barely. "Being away from you was killing me. But I don't want loving you to be my identity. I don't want to lose everything if you leave."

It's not perfect, nowhere near, but it's a small step in the right direction. "I really messed things up, didn't I?"

"The mistake wasn't solely yours, Shiro," Keith says, tracing the table's woodgrain pattern with his middle finger. "We were both dishonest with our feelings, and we made a lot of mistakes. We both thought of Adam as an obstacle, rather than a person, and that was wrong. He deserved better, we all did, but he was the only innocent party here. But even if he hadn't been around, we wouldn't have worked out. We were a disgusting soup of abandonment issues, trauma, and a barely present survival instinct. We latched on to one another in gross, unhealthy ways, and I don't think we'd have lasted very long if we'd have started dating back then. Eventually I would have gotten frustrated that you weren't filling the void left by my dad, and you would have realised that I'm incapable of fixing emotional and physical scars. We'd have been too unstable, and we probably would have grown to resent each other. I didn't want that, Shiro. It's why I left. I didn't want to let our friendship fester and rot for the sake of a maybe relationship that would have eventually ate shit. You mean too much to me."

Shiro's floored by not just the honesty, but the realisation that Keith is right. He'd built up a fake potential romance in his head that would never have come to fruition. It's not that his love for Keith wasn't true, or real. Loving Keith was as natural to him as breathing, but he'd wanted Keith to need him, desperately, to make him feel useful. Keith had been one of the only people to truly see him, to look past the scars and gilded metal, and that had been intoxicating. He'd have self-sabotaged at some point, terrified that Keith would stop putting him on a pedestal and see him as little more than the damaged person he was.

"You're right," Shiro says without preamble. The admission is strangely freeing, shackles cracking and falling to the ground. He sucks in his first full breath in a long time before he continues. "What I wanted was idealistic and unsustainable. I wasn't ready. _We _weren't ready."

Keith turns away from the table to stare out of the window, propping himself up with a palm against his cheek as he watches shoppers pass them by. There's a lingering undercurrent of defiance there, but it's of less bratty resilience the Shiro is used to, and more of a completive hashing out of feelings. "I don't want to deify you anymore," Keith finally says, haltingly and carefully curling his tongue around the words. He doesn't move his head, but he does slant a look in Shiro's direction. "I've spent years building you up as an unattainable God, and it's bullshit. You're just a fucking _person ._I didn't know how to cope with my admiration, so I warped it. I don't want to do that again. Not this time."

Shiro doesn't immediately know how to counter this, so he hums in agreement. It's not that he doesn't understand where Keith is coming from, or why, but the ambiguity leaves a lot to be desired, and he can't bear to commit himself to one interpretation or another. This is either the tentative start of a new chapter (no, not a chapter, but a whole new book), or it's the final exchange before the inevitable '_The End._' Either way, its weighted with a finality that Shiro is ill-equipped to deal with. Shiro knows what he wants, but he no longer blindly gives into wishful thinking.

"This time?"

"I love you," Keith practically whispers, slowly reorienting himself until he's face to face with Shiro. It feels like Keith's drawing out the inevitable, but Shiro has no desire to hurry him along, he's too busy stumbling over the repeated confession, bruising his knees. "I'm _in _love with you. That didn't go away, Shiro. Honestly, I don't know if it ever will. It feels like a universal absolute."

"Keith, I –"

Keith waves away the thought with a deliberate flick of his wrist. "I understand if you don't feel the same, or if this is too much, too soon after Adam, and what happened…. But, if you want to, we can start over. No bullshit, no secrecy, no lies. I want to be with you, Shiro. I want to be with you, but we need to start from scratch, go slow. A total do-over."

Shiro mulls over the statement in full, hoping that his body doesn't betray the internal chaos. He extends a hand in open invitation, smirk pulling at the corner of his lips, heart deliriously full. It's hard to tell how long they've been sat together, time feels warped and mangled, though pleasantly so. They're space dust, born from the same fragment of the universe and destined to come together again and again and again. A frat house porch, a snowy winter's evening. Shiro extends his hand towards Keith in mock greeting. "It's Keith, right?"

Keith's responding smile is blinding, and when he clasps Shiro's hand, it's less of a handshake and more of a lovesick intertwining of their fingers. Keith laughs, skin flushing the prettiest shade of pink. "Right."

"I'm Shiro."

* * *

**EPILOGUE**

It ends where it began.

With a slightly war-torn – suitably space themed - black and white wedding invitation. It's pinned to the refrigerator between an obligatory (read: at Krolia and Kolivan's non-negotiable insistence) 'first day of pre-school' photo of Keith and his brother, Akira, and a tacky Area 51 postcard from the Holts latest family vacation.

The rest of refrigerator door is similarly cluttered; photos spanning a decade, miscellaneous postcards, a copy of an ultrasound (which Lance had tearfully handed out to _everyone, _much to Allura's mild, if not still fond, embarrassment), a worn 30thbirthday card with hippos on it, an MS paint diploma celebrating Kosmo's graduation from training school.

Keith affectionately eyes the invitation from over the rim of his coffee cup, fingers curling tighter around the chipped ceramic mug, and he permits himself a small, fond smile. The image he has cultivated for himself doesn't allow for an overripe, pillow-soft heart that thrives, unashamedly, on domesticity and sentimentality. The pastel pink, incredibly fluffy slippers he's wearing probably don't help either.

A pair of arms wind themselves around Keith's waist, pulling him back towards a solid and warm chest. He abandons the practically untouched coffee cup next on the countertop next to the fridge, and lips gently press themselves against the side of Keith's head, forcing a full body shudder. "Good morning, baby."

"Mmm, morning."

"Let's go back to bed."

Keith laughs, breathless and content and deliriously in love. "We just woke up."

"Who said anything about sleeping?" A hand strays from Keith's waist to dip below the waistband of his sweatpants, blowing his sleep addled mind with the intertwining sensations of scolding hot skin and a cool, smooth ring, and Keith can't help the little gasp that breaks free. Emboldened by Keith's response, the hand inches lower, settling just below the pubic bone. Keith instinctively relaxes, body becoming soft and pliant, and totally vulnerable. "Come on, I want to show you how much I love you."

"Then show me." The accompanying '_I love you too_' goes unspoken, but that's okay, it doesn't need to be said. Keith's certain that he knows. He can feel the lips smirk against his skin, the barest hint of scraping teeth, igniting something feral and predatory. Keith pushes back against the body, desperate and needy, snaking one of his hands up and behind him to tenderly thread his fingers through tangled hair. "_Please _show me."

"Patience yields focus."

In real life you can't always get the person of your dreams. The planets don't align, intertwining your destinies, and sometimes heartbreak isn't a temporary plot device, but simply heartbreak.

"Shiro, you're so lame."

But sometimes, just sometimes, life is kind.

* * *

_We invite our most treasured loved ones, friends and family found,_  
to join us for the long-awaited wedding of  
SHIRO & KEITH  
_On the 15_thof June at 7pm.  
At "THE OLD SHACK IN THE DESERT" (be there or be square!)  
_Reception and all-night bonfire to follow._  
_Good food. Great music. Really bad dancing.  
_**It'll be out of this world!**


End file.
